


Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure

by Reinette_de_la_Saintonge



Category: 18th Century CE RPF, Turn (TV 2014)
Genre: 18th Century, Awkward Conversations, Awkward Sexual Situations, BDSM, Bayonetplay, Being Walked In On, Blindfolds, Blood, Character Study, Clothed Sex, Cuddling & Snuggling, Denial of Feelings, Dom/sub, Dubious Ethics, Dubious Morality, F/M, Falling In Love, Floor Sex, Fluff and Smut, Gratuitous Smut, Hair-pulling, Knifeplay, Locked In, Making Up, Masturbation, Mild Painplay, Military Uniforms, Mirror Sex, Naked Female Clothed Male, Period Typical Attitudes, Post-Coital Cuddling, Praise Kink, Prostitution, Reunion Sex, Rope Bondage, Rough Sex, Semi-Public Sex, Sex, Simcoe gets his barrel, Smut, Sort Of, Surprises, Wall Sex, Weapons Kink, mild choking
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-09
Updated: 2018-10-14
Packaged: 2019-06-07 13:19:05
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 24,584
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15219998
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Reinette_de_la_Saintonge/pseuds/Reinette_de_la_Saintonge
Summary: Over the years, she had become quite adept at reading men.





	1. The Curious Cull

**Author's Note:**

> By popular (well, you people who asked for it know who you are…!) demand: more Lola! 
> 
> The title is of course borrowed from John Cleland's "Fanny Hill: Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure" (1749).
> 
> This is going to be a few chapters long and will update from time to time, all you need to know is this is told from Lola's point of view and will over the course of the story chronicle her time with Simcoe. She really deserved to be a character, not just a plot device.

She stood before the man in the red uniform who was seated behind the table; did he know who she was?

She was older now, they both were, a few strands of grey had come to haunt her hair and the lines around her mouth and on her forehead had deepened, but she had recognised him on the spot, even if his hair was almost completely grey now and his belly round. The likes of him only got the best cuts at the table.

When she’d seen him, it had taken her two glances to recognise him, but there was no mistake, she’d know these eyes wherever she’d go.

Years had passed since they had last met. She smoothed her skirts and smiled the teasing smile she’d always given him long, long ago.

Their eyes collided, and for one second, she could see the young man he once had been.

Before she could open her mouth to say anything, he spoke:

“Lady Lola?”

Her smile broadened.

 

 

 

 

When Lola had first met her most curious cull, it had been 1781, not long before the Battle of Yorktown would de facto bring the separation of the Colonies from the British Empire.

He’d been stationed there, a tall figure of a man with a perpetual sullenness to his face that was only accentuated by the additional frown he wore to accompany the critical look in his eyes when he had come down her street and looked her and the other girls there over.

She’d been standing there for quite a while in the cool air of a late afternoon, waiting for a customer.

Around her, the nightly life of the Holy Ground was waking slowly, while those who had laboured for yet another hard, long day slowly began to head home.

Then, a large shadow had darkened the sun unexpectedly and she’d looked up to find out what, or rather who it was.

He was tall, very tall indeed and even taller with that cap of his with feathers on it. Although making the wearer appear taller was the intended purpose of his headgear, on him it was almost ridiculously pointless and she would have laughed, had she not known better (she wanted a customer, after all) and his facial expression (and the bayonet and pistol dangling at his side, one never could be too cautious) discouraged her from doing so.

His uniform was not one of the ones one saw frequently around these parts and at first, she thought, judging by the colour, he might be some sort of special Hessian Jäger (she had become quite good at recognising uniforms over time), but when he spoke to her, there was no mistake he was not one of the Sauerkraut-chewing faction who came for some _Weib_ after his _Feierabendbier_.

His accent was clearly that of a well-to-do Englishman, though his voice indicated he was more of an English _woman_. For one moment, she thought he might be an opera singer, which would explain the false-something or how they called a high male voice, but would not explain why he was here. After all, those men had lost their manhood for art and were, or so she’d heard, not interested in girls.

“You there”, he had pointed her out from among the other women who stood nearby and asked her for her prices.

“Depends on what you want”, she had grinned lasciviously, “or what your pay can buy.”

Her hand roamed over his epaulette, stroking the silver tassels.  Oh, she was sure this man could buy quite a fair bit, given his fancy looks and colonel's insignia- those however could be deceiving, too. He didn’t look like the excessive sort, though, with more parties and girls than money. He looked like a man who didn’t like parties and thus evaded the host of other social vices that came with such engagements- drinking, gluttony, excessive spending and women.

-And yet he was here. So yes, a taste for women maybe, but that seemed to be it.

Over the years, she had become quite adept at reading men.

He was so pale his skin reflected the sunlight and his hair was ginger, blazing in the sun like a raging fire. But what was most striking about him were his eyes; blue like ice and so pale they were not only strikingly blue, but somehow translucent and seemed to reflect every slight change in his mood or the brightness of his surroundings like a mirror.

The very same eyes now stared at her with an unblinking, curious gaze.

“I require your basic services”, he had chirped in his bell-like voice- that could be arranged for.

She led him to her tent. Once inside, she had to admit his figure appeared to be even more striking, particularly because he stood straight and didn’t move at first and reminded her very much of a very impractically big statue.

She turned around, unfastening her rather lose robes at the front, so that he was not able to see anything except for her back. She didn’t know why, but she sensed it would be quite interesting to tease him a little. She liked curious culls, and this one seemed to be just the sort with his broad built but unfittingly girlish voice combined with the war-like rigour the bayonet at his belt spoke of and set him apart from most officers she’d known so far.

Clearly, he was a man one didn’t meet every day- and above all, he was the clean and orderly sort, much preferable as a customer compared to some dirty drunkard seeking her services late at night to crown a successful evening of drinking and brawling in some alehouse with the supposed “conquest” of a pirate queen, noble lady, harem slave girl, virgin maiden or stern governess- she had been everything.

This one was too good to be true, someone like him could likely afford better than her (like the actresses of Rivington’s Corner, sprightly girls in the finest dresses and diamonds dangling from their necks, who entertained redcoat officers with their singing and dancing and received lavish presents and substantial payments in return for their favours).

Perhaps he liked something more deviant than the actress-belles were offering? She’d seen her fair share after twelve years in the Holy Ground and taken part in quite a bit herself. Hm. She would have to see. After all, he was somewhat stiff (not where he should be, given what he was paying her for), standing there at what might be classified as a distance implying decency in society, watching.

Coquettishly, she slid her gown off one shoulder first, giving him time to imagine what her front would look like after this action, left breast exposed and the rose-coloured fabric hanging loosely around her body like a curtain ready to be pulled in order to reveal the stage to the theatregoer.

The kiss on her shoulder took her off-guard.

Taken aback, she tensed somewhat and turned her head. Their eyes collided, her black depths locking with the icy blue of his. He looked offended, almost like a right proper mamma at whose table a rude anecdote has been told, which almost caused her to laugh, because such delicate offended-ness one would not have expected in a hardy man of Mars.

-Sadness, there was sadness, too. It was heartbreakingly endearing to see this mountain of a man standing there, suspended between being offended and a scolded puppy dog, shoulders slouching ever so slightly.

The sadness however ran deeper than that; in her life, she had seen enough of it herself to know that the man’s soul wasn’t at peace.

Pity overcame her. It had not been her intention to upset him, she simply hadn’t expected this, most men didn’t like to pretend long and took what they had paid for and afterwards left as quickly as they’d come. There was no tenderness in that, no sweetness.

This business was none of love, it was for flesh and the pleasure thereof. Was this part of his curiousness? If it was, she’d seen far worse and could accommodate to it.

She gave him a suggestive half-smile and turned again, this time allowing her robe to slip off her right shoulder, too.

Lola waited. Was he not interested anymore? Or maybe, the catch she’d suspected all along was that he couldn’t-? Her line of thought was abandoned in surprise when two strong, green-clad arms came to reach around her and gently pushed her gown the rest of the way down until it pooled around her feet, leaving her as God had created her.

Ah. So he wasn’t unresponsive to it after all, she noted as his arms drew her close against him until her back was flush against his chest.

The surprising softness of his hands made for a stark contrast to the roughness of the woollen fabric of his coat.

Once more she was taken aback to find him not getting to it, but resting his head against her shoulder, like a trusting dog laying his head on his master’s knee. Perhaps this was what he wanted to be, a dog, and she his master, Lola reasoned, trying to make sense of this rather curious man who had wound his arms around her like tendrils of ivy; strong and firm, but also gentle- and green, given the colour of his coat.

The longer they rested in this position, the more she became aware of the little details of this scene; how she could feel his heartbeat resounding in her own chest and his slow, regular breathing caressing her ear.

Some of his remarkably ginger and equally untameable locks brushed the side of her face in a feather-like caress, teasing her jawline.

At last, she broke the spell and gently but firmly beckoned him to disentangle himself from her.

With an alluring sway of her hips, she walked over to the bed, where she sat down.

“Now, aren’t you going to do it?”, she asked with a facial expression that was supposed to tease him, pretending she did not hold him for more than a brave fifteen-year-old who had come to her for a bet.

He looked her in the eyes and gave the curtest little “yes”, before he started to undo his cravat, straightened it out and laid it over the back of the chair she kept for that purpose- not that it was often needed.

He continued in this amusingly slow and precise manner, removing his weapons, coat and waistcoat next, which he hung over the back of the chair before he reached his shirt.

He folded it neatly.

This was too much for Lola, and she broke into a soft chuckle.

“What is the matter?”, he asked, again somewhere between being offended and scolded.

“I don’t think you paid me for the whole night”, she teased, “and as it looks like, you could be a while.”

The cull did not get the teasing nature of her statement and replied “Yes. You will be afforded what is due to you for your troubles.”

Next came his boots and stockings. His breeches however, he preferred to keep on- wasn’t the whole point of this arrangement to get them off?

As he stood there, bare-chested and towering over her, Lola was quite certain he would not be the worst customer she had ever had.

He was clean and easy on the eye- more than what could be said about most men seeking her services.

She rose from her bedstead and came to face him- even now, he did not look at what he had purchased and only met her eyes again with this unfamiliar gaze as if he was studying her, trying to invade her mind through her eyes or something. Was he one of these people who could hypnotise others? Was he trying that with her?

Beth, who lived and worked next door, said she’d seen the like on a fair once, but that it only worked with people who believed in it.

So far, it wasn’t working. She was still Lola, in her tent with the most curious cull she had ever been with, and not a chicken in a henhouse or the Queen of France or whatever these people made you think you were.

At last, Lola decided it was enough being mysterious and that he should come to the reason of his visit. She didn’t like people who took long roads to their destination when the same journey could be achieved in half the time.

Still not breaking eye contact, she deftly reached for the seam of his breeches and watched as he inhaled sharply when she found what she had been looking for beneath the fabric.

He was quite impressive, even half-hard, though Lola knew better than anyone that the length and girth of their instruments, which men were wont to pride themselves with, was seldom indicative of a skillful lover; on the contrary, those loudly proclaiming theirs was the largest were as per her experience usually entirely un-fashioned for the art of pleasure, thinking that the sight of their exposed nether parts alone would send a woman into rapture.

She needn’t like it, of course, they paid her, but these fellows usually required some sort of encouragement and assurance of their virility, which did not extend the fact that they had been born with that part of the anatomy that set men and women apart. Usually, some half-hearted moaning and false exclamations of bliss would do the trick, which they couldn’t distinguish from the real thing. In their self-absorbedness and –reliance on their supposedly impressive pricks (they never were), they didn’t notice.

Oh, so she had found herself _that sort_. She’d known there had to be a catch.

The man bowed his head down to her and pulled her hand away.

“No, no”, breathed lowly while his hand still kept hers at her side.

With his other hand, he reached for her hair and buried it there, determined and with firmness, yet careful not to hurt as he drew her in until his lips met hers.

So no bawdy Mr Tape Rule, they usually didn’t need that, he was a _romantic_. Had he recently lost a beloved to another man, or had been deceived by a cheating wife, or maybe seen a sweetheart die- he came from battle, perhaps there had been some British Molly Pitcher, what did she know?

She’d need to ask him what name she should call him, and also, what her name would be, with his eyes closed, he could then pretend she was whatever Aurora, Flora, Clara or Anna he was longing for, or rather lusting after. He hadn’t paid her for a chaste walk in the park or a dinner at his parents’ house after all.

Kissing was the part Lola liked least about her profession; she could deal with the rest of it alright, seeing that it paid well enough and gave her the freedom and autonomy she had not known before coming to the Colonies as a girl, as she could simply turn her head and think of other things when it got too bad with some, but having the man directly in her face felt more personal to her than letting him between her legs did. She’d of course had other things in her face than another person’s face over time, but somehow, watching him as his lips joined hers, his eyes heavy-lidded and his long lashes almost brushing her cheek caused her much more not entirely pleasant emotions. 

The kiss, which had started chastely enough with his lips merely touching hers, testing, soon deepened and his tongue demanded entrance to her mouth. She let him do it (contemplating if she could charge him another sixpence or five for the favour) and gave her best to respond in the same manner, leaning into his embrace (he had let go of her hand eventually and wrapped his arm around her back instead) in order to steady herself against the much taller and stronger man who was intent to bruise her lips if he would continue like this.

So no romantic, but a man who liked to hurt them? She’d let them punish her, if that was what they liked, but there were limits to what she’d do, or rather, let be done. They were far from her favourite sort of customers (those who were quick and gone even quicker) and their sport not at all to her taste. Were she to be with a man whom she’d allow to bed her without any payment and who would promise her the moon (or rather the night), she’d certainly not ask him to hit her until her behind was raw.

For them, it might be a game but for her, it wasn’t. These men had never seen another person get flogged until their skin fell off their back.

Suddenly, he let go of her lips to draw breath, and she used the moment to take him by the hand and led him over to the bed, the critical battlefield for her brave colonel.

She allowed herself to fall back, looking up at him.

“Won’t you join me?”

“Of course”, he chirped in his amusingly high voice that didn’t fit the man it belonged to and awkwardly lowered himself down on her, still clad in his breeches.

“What can I do to make you like it?”, she purred encouragingly while playing with a strand of his hair, “or don’t you know because you are-“

She liked teasing him, she liked the idea that he was dangerous, his weapons not far away from him in the corner and that he could, had he the mind to do so, crush her underneath him, but didn’t. She enjoyed it because she wanted to see how far she could go with this brave commander who pretended to be such a hard man in the street but was soft as molten butter in her tent. He was odd, and she wanted to know what there was to him.

“Of course not”, he was quick to respond with indignation lifting his voice another octave, “just stay as you are.”

Not half as outlandish she had thought it would be like in the beginning, on the contrary, he seemed to be of the tame sort. Had he forgotten he wasn’t a young lad with shaky legs at his first time, who trembled as much as the childhood sweetheart stretched out before him on their first encounter?

This circumstance should not be to her disadvantage, not at all; she’d have some easily-earned money when he was done.

He kissed her again, his body now weighing down upon hers. He was very gentle in his kissing this time and did nothing but that for a few moments, still so very shy, kissing and taking her hands, laying them down on either side of her head, where he intertwined his fingers with hers.

In order to encourage him and light his flame, she, taking him by surprise, used all her force to roll them over, so that he had to look up at her.

This had the desired effect: the shy ginger mountain quickly learned to appreciate this change of position and chose to run his hands up and down her body, greedy like a street-urchin grabbing for some cakes at the market when the baker wasn’t looking.

His hands were big, somewhat calloused, but not at all unpleasant; warm and tender, he allowed his fingers to trace her spine and cup the firm twin-globes of her behind.

The feeling of his wiry chest against her breasts, more a by-product of their position than any consciously administered treatment, distracted her into a moment of passiveness, which he made use of to flip them back over again.

The most august Colonel Curious was now kneeling over her, watching her with those unsettlingly blue eyes as he stroked across her breasts at first, and then gripped their centres firmly, mingling the surprising friction with a teasing feather-light caress of a finger.

“Good?”, he asked her, and she could not deny, it was nice. He seemed to be one of the few men who appeared to understand the difference between bread dough and a woman’s breast. He continued fondling her with one hand as he kissed her again, this time only briefly on the mouth to make his way down her neck and then, alternating, to each of her breasts and then even further down-

Lola caught her breath. What was he doing?

Once, a few years back, she’d been paid to visit a lady, a high-born one even, who had told her to do that for her. The pay had been good and the lady pleasant, but nothing had come of it as her dear papa, with whom she lived, seemed to have found out about her inclinations towards her own sex and married her at the first opportunity to some rich merchant and that had been that.

Never before however had she been the recipient and moaned in earnest as his “kiss” intensified.

She grabbed the back of his head in wanton desperation and he didn’t stop, didn’t stop even when she thought it was too much, he held her firm in his grip, bent her thighs down on the bed and only looked up at her again when she had given an honest cry of pleasure and her body convulsed with shudders.

He let go of her and rose to his knees, thus displaying his evident readiness, still constricted below his breeches, to her.

Quick as a cat, she was by his side and freed the citizen yearning for liberty. This time, he was not opposed to her caresses, bold and practiced, which elicited sounds of pleasure from him and once more tilted her face up at him to kiss her. She could taste herself on his lips and felt utterly debauched, more like a decadent lady from a story than a Holy Ground whore.

Colonel Curious took her in his arms and laid her out before him, before he lowered himself down on her again, this time nudging at the critical spot of conquest.

His shyness seemed gone now and he thrust into her with a blissful groan, taking her with fervour.

This time was his entirely, and although still somewhat surprised by the care he had afforded her, she allowed her mind to rove away now as his onslaught on her body intensified.

-To some degree, all men believed theirs was the most impressive weapon.

Although quite busy chasing after satisfaction, he noticed she was not in this moment with him and stopped moving, frowning for a moment that made him look fearsome, before he got to it again, slipping a hand between their bodies and stroking her where she was the most sensitive, staying in time with his movements at all times.

Panting, they both were on the precipice of passion; her hands holding firmly on to his backside, encouraging him to keep going, his lips on hers once more, but this time, she did not mind in any way at all.

As their foreheads crushed against another in the clumsiness that comes with passion, Lola realised she hadn’t asked for his name, or hers, in this situation.

Their eyes met in a second in which their mouths weren’t connected, after all, they still needed air to breathe, and between two loud moans, elicited by the more fervent pace and pressure of his fingers, she came to know it without asking.

“Oh-“

When she broke of there, unable to think straight or speak, he quickly filled in the gap for her.

“John. I am John”, he panted and that was the last time he said anything in a long while.

“Yes John, please-“ but he had sealed her mouth with his, their tongues dancing a dance far more intoxicating than a mannerly minuet. In that instant, she thought this was what he lived on, an incubus, drinking pleasure directly from his victim.

Moments later, both of them were overtaken by rapture and collapsed to a panting pile of entangled limbs.

He had lifted himself off her then and pulled his breeches back up, as if the shy shame of before had returned. Then, he turned to one side. Extending one arm, he brought it around her and pulled her close.

With her bottom against his groin, she’d suspected some rutting or some such but instead, he only held her, as chastely as a little girl her doll.

What was it with this man? She couldn’t make sense of him. And she didn’t need to. He’d pay her and be gone soon enough.

Minutes passed and he still didn’t let go of her. For some reason, she didn’t have the heart to tell him to let go and be on his way, and if she was honest to herself, she even liked it, being held like that by this most curious of culls, steady, firmly in an embrace that would assure any woman he’d conquer the world for her.

Completely at ease, she allowed herself to close her eyes, to rest a while. She’d been up all day and had not had cause to expect it would conclude so pleasantly.

John appeared to have noticed, though and withdrew his arm to sit up and walk over to his clothes.

Without a word, he dressed himself, first stockings and boots, then shirt, cravat, waistcoat, sash and jacket, his weapons came last.

All the while, she watched and formed the opinion that watching him dress had been a lot more interesting than watching him undress- she’d learned quite a bit about him from observing him closely without him noticing.

Before he went, she carelessly tossed her discarded gown over her head as well, not because she thought it necessary to cover herself in front of John, but because it had become quite cold.

He was ready to leave, counting his money with his back turned towards her, as if he didn’t want her to see the money she would receive.

John obviously didn’t like the idea that he paid her and preferred pretending she was his lover, which was the reason he’d taken such surprising care of her, too.

How lonely must a man be to seek comfort in the likes of her, comfort beyond a quick toss and tumble and a jug of stale ale? And what made a man like him lonely? He was hiding something, from himself, from the world, from her.

Not being one to like unsolved mysteries, she hoped he’d come back, maybe she’d learn his secret then.

Coins still in his hand, she could not help but to give him some parting words: “Maybe I should be paying you for being so sweet to me.”

But where had the sensitive, shy John of their recent encounter gone? Back in his uniform, he was the stern colonel again, the frowning one, not the soft-lipped seducer.

“I suggest you reserve your tongue for other purposes.”

Clearly, he was affected and tried to play-act, but that didn’t work with her. She’d have liked to shoot back at him that if anything, it had been the other way ‘round and she thought that his great, big, dark secret in which he seemed to enwrap himself like a cloak might go away if he stopped being so cold and uncaring when it was clear he was anything but, but let it be as a knock and a the low call of one of his men called him to duty.

Artists liked characterful landscapes, dancers difficult dances and she liked John- sometimes, at least. Everyone needed a challenge. Perhaps he’d come back and then, she’d give him a piece of her mind, and she did have quite a few things in mind for him, if he was willing to try them, at least.

Humming a cheerful melody, she rose to find herself something to eat and to stop by Beth on the way- she had a good story now to tell by her little fire, where they would often sit and talk about their hopes, dreams, the past, the present, the work or people they'd met.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Lola has picked up some German from the Hessians: Sauerkraut should be clear, I think. "Weib" means woman, often only used in antiquated contexts (such as historical fiction) and bears a negative, derogatory connotation today. And here, the most important word of all, Feierabendbier, meaning after work pint.  
> Really, I put this in there to make fun of the hilariously stereotypical and inaccurate depiction (their accents weren't even remotely German, let alone Hessian) of the German soldiers Abe sells his cabbage to.


	2. Lord Simcoe

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Simcoe seeks Lola out after a tough day at work and has to learn she is a force to be reckoned with...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You have probably seen the tags have updated. Have fun!
> 
> One warning, though: in the end of this chapter, Lola briefly refers to past physical abuse, some of it in her childhood. It's entirely non-graphic and very brief, but as some people might like to be warned in advance, I thought I put a note here.

Only a few days after she had first met him, John had come back down her street and asked her services.

Gladly, she had accepted- there were worse things than being paid to lie back and enjoy things.

When she had told Beth about it the other day, she had said it must have been a dream- especially soldiers were not known to be the tender sort.

“Sometimes, you’re lucky”, she had said, shrugging, and the small blonde Scotswoman whose accent was heavier than many men she’d been with had laughed, saying she’d only believe it when he’d do the same for her.

“I wonder if he’ll come back”, Lola had heard herself say out loud.

“If you did your job well”, Beth had replied. “Liked it enough for his taste-“

“Maybe he will. He is a curious man.”

“If your Mr Curious has some taste, he’ll come back”, Beth, who was some twenty years Lola’s senior but looked, due to her smallness of stature and her still very long, blonde hair considerably younger than that, smiled, “who could resist them big, dark eyes of yours, child?”

As soon as she had recognised him, her heart had leapt- he had come for her, hadn’t he, or would he want another one?

Indeed, he walked straight towards her as soon as he had spotted her and asked for the same as the last time, to which she gladly agreed.

Slipping her hand in his, she led him to her tent.

Once inside the small space of next to inexistent privacy, she helped him with his coat and sat down on the bed as she had done the last time.

She wanted answers, and she would get them.

Again he stood before her while she sat there, her legs crossed and leaning a little backwards to let the slightest hint of her nipples show through the edge of her neckline that was more of a breastline. A little encouragement couldn’t hurt.

“You’re here again. Why?”

Lola sat down on the bed, leaving him standing before her, having deposed of his baldric, cravat and coat already.

“I thought given the services you offer that would be evident.”

“Nothing is evident. Why are you here?”

“Because I wanted to see you.”

By the way the pitch of his voice rose, Lola could tell he was becoming uncomfortable. Good. She wanted him writhing a little bit, even though (for now) only figuratively speaking.

“And why would you want to see me, me of all the women in York City?”

“You did well last time.”

“Didn’t you do better than me?”, she teased, grinning up at him unabashedly. He still thought he could play the mighty military man, but she knew better. Had he forgotten?

Men never seemed to notice the women whose time and bodies they bought for a short while to saturate their pleasures were people, too, with thoughts, minds and senses of their own. It was just so much easier to regard a whore for nothing but her cunt and likely spared many a gentleman internal moral conflicts he would otherwise have felt, were he to regard her as a woman in the same way as he did his wife. But then, if men would regard her and her fellow Holy Ground girls as they did their wives, she and all the rest of them would be out of work.

John blushed adorably, as if ashamed and cast his eyes to the ground.

“You wanted me to like it”, she prodded deeper, seeing as she had struck a chord, “and I did.”

“I am glad our last encounter was to your satisfaction”, he said as if he were talking to a fellow officer about some manoeuvre that turned out well or some such.

“No other cull’s ever done that for me, usually they pay for me to do that for them. You are a great kisser. I wonder for how many women you went on your knees and-“ Her smile froze as John, his face now clouded with ire, came at her in one big, determined step of his impossibly long (and decently muscled) legs.

“ _Enough_ ”, he hissed.

His hands flew to her robe, ripping it open at the front in one determined movement.

Lightning-fast, faster than she would have thought a mountain like him could be, he had one hand on her throat, pushing her down towards the bed.

He wasn’t hurting her as he did so, nor did he apply so much pressure as would jeopardise with her airflow, but held her firmly down while he came upon her, forcing her to look at him as he pushed her skirts up with his free hand and stood between her legs.

He let go of her neck but still held her down with one hand, now at her shoulder, while he freed himself with the other.

One-handed, it took him some time to open his breeches and push them down, giving Lola time to muse that she had underestimated him. She’d go along with what he was doing as long he really wouldn’t hurt her (after all, he was a paying customer and if this was his fantasy, she would oblige) but she was angry at him nonetheless and, solely out of spite, re-arranged her surprised face to show nothing but indifference and contempt. Perhaps it was foolish, perhaps he really was more dangerous and dangerous to her than she had initially supposed, but he deserved it.

If he was getting some kind of cheap satisfaction for his prick out of it, she would get some from the fact she’d ruined it for him.

“You pretend you don’t like it this time, but you do, I can tell”, he mocked her, pushing two of his fingers into her folds and feeling her there, pinched the bud of her sex, making her squirm.

“If I am not much mistaken, you like it very much.”

And then, he was at her breasts again, kissing and biting with sharp, yet careful nips, making her hold back exclamations of pleasure and pain alike.

Angry, he almost was even better than when not.

How had he led her to believe he didn’t know what he was doing last time?

Some moments later, he considered it time to bury himself inside her, roughly and with force, ignoring her hands that were flying up to him out of sheer spite. Calmly, he captured them in one hand and used the other to grip her hip, angling her to his satisfaction. 

“Turn”, he instructed, and before Lola could do so much as process what he had said, he had withdrawn from her and released her hands, spinning her around. All she could do was brace herself against the bedding unto which she was now pressed by Johns weight, who unceremoniously parted her thighs with the rough shove of a knee and thrust into her again.

“You still like it”, came his truly unnecessary comment, quickening his pace even more with his hands holding her hips in a vice-like grip he only loosened on one side to accentuate his argument by reaching between her legs and stroking her there much too softly.

She couldn’t help but moan.

“You see?”, he chuckled in his annoying voice that made her fantasise about shutting him up, forcing a piece of cloth between his teeth or better still, taking him by his rudely red hair and pressing his face into a pillow until he would no longer be able to struggle against her, “a shame we don’t have a mirror at hand, or you could see for yourself.”

At that, he stopped caressing her and instead grabbed her hair, yanking it back somewhat to make her body arch into his.

Some of the more posh places had that, rooms with mirrors for customers who liked them, she however could not offer such luxuries.

He had not been mistaken- there was a hidden tease to him, even thinking about how they would look like now in a mirror she would never be able to afford, even when he had pushed her against the bed; perhaps it had to do with the fact she hadn’t expected this behaviour of him.

John, so angry, so lonely wanted to be cared for and about and had probably seen it as deceit that she had teased him a little, and only playfully so.

This was to be her punishment, then, a mixture of pleasure and pain. Oh, she’d return the favour before he’d know what was happening.

He was close, very close. Good. Even better. This would only aid the plans for her surprise attack.

One swift, well-placed kick against his shin was enough to make him yelp with pain and momentarily let go of her. Within seconds, she was on her feet and behind him, pushing her soldier caught in an ambush onto the bed- he resisted, but a second, though less painful, kick into the hollow of the knee caused him to stumble and fall as she had intended. Before he could so much as make sense of what had transpired since he had thought himself in control, she straddled his torso and used her hands to restrain his wrists.

In a passing second, it occurred to her that by physical strength only, he could easily best her, get her back down beneath him and continue, but he didn’t.

“You think it would be that easy?”

A triumphant smirk crept across her lips.

“It is my rules we’re playing by now.”

John was visibly frustrated, having been denied the sweet relief he had anticipated so and glared at her with venomous eyes not unlike those of a basilisk, a creature she’d heard was capable of killing by making eye-contact with its victims.

Twice he bucked under her weight on his ribs, but by mustering all her force, she managed to hold him firm.

“Now”, Lola began in a strict tone, “if you want to get what I can give you, you must do as I say. Understood?”

“Yes”, he hissed. It was evident from the sound of his voice he only agreed to her terms to have her stop weighing down on him, which she imagined might be somewhat uncomfortable.

“I am going to release you and you will not move. You will not touch me, hold me or anything else. Your hands stay where they are.”

Again, his half-hearted nod only illustrated too well he did not want to agree to her terms in order to gain relief.

“I pay you”, he snarled, trying to add the threat of not-paying and insult to the situation.

This however would not help him much, if anything, he was his own worst enemy and presently aggravating his situation- he didn’t know that yet, but he’d find out soon enough.

“Correct”, Lola sang sweetly as if thanking him for a compliment, he wouldn’t win. He may be a commander on the battlefield, but this was her tent, and this was her retribution.

All the beautiful little plans she had intricately laid out in her head thinking what she’d do with Curious John were laid aside- this man seemed so entirely different, enraged with passion with a taste for roughness.

Was the man before her a twin, identical to his tender brother, the exact opposite of John? No, couldn’t be. He wore a Colonel’s uniform and there only ever was one colonel in the regiment. Had to be him.

“And now, you stop talking.”

Her hand, which had only shortly before held his wrist down, was now at his neck and in contrast to him, she intentionally flexed her muscles and pressed her fingers into the soft, vulnerable skin of his neck, leaving him some moments to contemplate if she would ever let go again before finally releasing him.

Content, she noticed how he gasped for air- had he really thought she would kill him, in her tent at that? Even if she wanted that (she didn’t), she wouldn’t do it here, among her things, where the evidence would point directly to her. She was cleverer than that.

With the same hand, she reached for the floor, where John’s sash, which had been a little in the way when he had taken her, had come to rest, crumpled and disorderly.

There was only interest in his eyes as the bright blue and a tad unsettling ice-clumps with irises in them followed her every movement until they didn’t anymore.

“Lift your head.”

“You will not-“

“Hush”, she soothed him and kissed him appraisingly when he followed her command.

“Very good.”

She liked the image of him lying there before her, not knowing what she would do next.

Oh, she knew exactly what she would do next- let him wait.

Lazily, she removed her torn gown and relished in the fact that he could not see her like this, standing naked before him.

“I suggest you get on with it or-“

“Or what?”, she cut him off, “you will get up and hurt your head stumbling in the darkness?”

“Remove the blindfold is what I would have suggested”, he replied dryly.

“Oh, you can do that”, she shot back, “but it won’t do you any good. Do you know where I have been? What I have done? I could have your weapons, that bayonet of yours or your pistol close by.”

“And you think you could best me?”

“A half-dressed man with his breeches around his knees?”

Laughing, Lola bent down over him again, taking his hands and guiding them to her breasts.

“I think we should care for your _other_ bayonet, should we not? Be good now.”

Good he was indeed, massaging them in the most delicious fashion.

“Very good”, she praised him, her breath now somewhat quicker than before, and thought he should be rewarded for his diligence.

Her hand enfolded his member and applying only the softest pressure, she ran up and down the length of it, once, twice, and listened as he moaned under her caress, thrusting his hips upwards to receive more than she was willing to give.

“You get more if you do what I say. Earn it.”

A grumble shaky with pleasure left his throat as she commanded him to sit up somewhat so she could remove his waistcoat and shirt.

She’d taken a liking to his chest, the ginger mass of soft hair there and the muscles that made her wonder if beneath his skin, he was made of marble.

“Well done.”

Kissing him on the mouth, she laid down on top of him, making him feel the length of her body, what he could have, and thus caused him to sit up and moan with pleasure in an attempt to conquer her.

This however was not what Lola had in mind for him and with an admonishing tone in her voice and a soft push against his shoulders commanded him to lie down again or he would not get anything at all.

John seemed to be so lost in his hunt for pleasure by now he obviously hadn’t noticed the irrelevant nature of her statement- if she wouldn’t please him, he wouldn’t pay, an unsatisfactory outcome for both involved, but he was long past caring for anything but his desire and the sweet relief thereof.

“Perhaps I should bind your hands, tie you up so you can’t move- your cravat has just the right length”, she said as if musing aloud to herself alone and noticed how John, though pressing a strained “no” through his lips as she let her fingers graze the skin of his inner thigh, his evident arousal indicated otherwise.

“Now- come on-“

“You are an officer”, Lola cooed in a sweet tone one might reserve for a small child, “a man of discipline and manners. What do we say?”

“Please”, he hissed, his voice twice as poisonous as the venom of a rattle-snake.

“Can you say that again? Prettily, like a well-born gentleman ought?”

She accentuated her question by letting her hand run up and down his length much too slowly to grant him relief.

“ _Please_ ”, he exclaimed, but Lola had not yet had enough of this game. Retribution was sweet.

“Once again.”

“ _Pretty_ please”, he tried, and Lola was satisfied. He still sounded strained and somewhat frustrated, but given what she had seen of him, it could be counted as a valiant effort.

Slowly, she came to straddle him and rolled her hips into his long-waiting member.

With an exclamation of bliss, John instinctively rose into a sitting position, grabbing her by the backside and pressing her against him.

She allowed it and kissed him as their rhythm quickened and at last, they both toppled over the edge of pleasure, held upright only by the arms of the other.

It was then Lola removed his blindfold and smiled into his face.

“Just so you know, I never touched your bayonet.”

“So I thought”, he replied composedly (well, as composedly as a man could be after having been with a woman), his face flushed and his chest heaving.

Covered in sweat and positively exhausted from the strong physical exertion she had been subjected to during their encounter, Lola climbed off him (it was a literal climb, this man truly was a mountain) and let herself fall down next to him, turning her back.

For some reason, she did not want to look at him right now.

After a few moments, a tentative hand softly snaked around her, coming to rest on her belly. Determinedly, he pulled her closer until once again, she rested against him. Her skin tingled and her muscles tensed, but there was nothing but gentleness.

He must have felt her stiff as a wooden plank against him and made a little humming-sound of disapproval.

His very large, very dangerous hands roamed her body, applying soft pressure, causing friction that warmed her skin even despite the comparatively cool air in the tent and she could feel herself relax, melt like a wax under his expert treatment.

Still, she did not turn around, unwilling, unable to look at him.

When he was done, he continued to hold her as he had done the last time, close against his body and without leaving any doubt he wanted to make himself believe there was more between them than what was or should be between a whore and a cull.

“I am sorry”, he whispered into her ear, “I should not have- did I hurt you?” John’s voice trembled.

“You didn’t.”

“Let me see.”

Next she knew, he was up on his elbows, leaning over her, running his fingers and eyes along her body once more.

“I am sorry for my roughness with you, I was _angry_ ”, he repeated in a voice heavy with some sort of helplessness and loathing directed at his own person at the sight of her breasts, which were still reddened from his attention earlier, and kissed them as if his kiss possessed magical properties as sometimes happened in fairy tales.

And to some degree, although this magic was quite earthly, it did: the wetness of his kisses felt cold against the air of the tent and did the exact opposite of what John probably intended to do, causing her nipples to stand at renewed attention, prickling deliciously.

However, she washed the thought of the pleasure she might feel if John only continued away from her mind to speak to him, answer his question.

“Don’t be. I’ve had worse. You wanted me to like it, too and you are kind to me, afterwards.”

At her words, storm clouds seemed to gather in John’s effervescent person and his mouth hardened to a thin line akin to a tight rope.

“Did someone hurt you?”, he asked in a voice that sounded as if he were ready to ride into battle against a long-standing foe.

“Yes.”

She rolled onto her side, so she was finally facing John properly.

“I was hit often, as a child, until I snuck on a ship to the Colonies. Flogged, everything. Not as much as others, but-“ she made a dismissive gesture with her hand as if all that didn’t matter anymore.

“Some culls, too, those who like to hurt them. Nothing too bad”, she assured him as she viewed a hint of warmth in the glacial depths of his eyes.

No, not warmth. A raging fire ready to consume everything standing in its way.

“I would never- whoever- _they will_ -“

His widened eyes told tales of killing and not for one moment since coming to know him had she doubted these eyes knew death better than the countenance of his own mother.

“You would not have much luck. You would be hanged, killing a rich plantation owner and his family, a few officers and some less fancy folk. And who’s ever heard of a man who died for his whore?”

A bitter smile on her face, she busied herself drawing patterns onto John’s chest and allowing her fingers to run through the hair there.

“Don’t say that word”, he ruled a little more sharply than he had anticipated.

“But it is the truth. I am no fair lady in a castle, and you aren’t a knight come to save me from a dragon. I am a simple Holy Ground whore and you a soldier who’ll soon go into battle, perhaps never to return.”

“There is no cause to worry, I shall always return.”

John sounded like a five-year-old playing at soldiering, lost in a world of braveryand adventures that only existed in his head.

“You never know.”

Seemingly without thinking, he tightened his arm around her.

“I know.”

His other hand once again found her hair, but this time, he did not pull; he smoothed it, running his hand down the outline of her head slowly, comfortingly.

“You are a lady”, he began, “and I never wish to hear that word again.”

“What, because it makes you feel better to bed a lady than a whore?”, Lola could not help but ask.

“Ah-ah. _The word._ ”

For a moment, he paused, thinking, with his brows knitted tightly together.

“But you are a lady”, he then continued. “to me, you are, more than most real ladies I’ve met, actually.”

“And you are some lord, taking me back to England as your wife?”

She snorted at the sheer impossibility of this statement before she went on, “you don’t even know my name.”

Ashamed, he evaded her eyes.

“It’s Lola”, she told him with a smile.

Most culls didn’t get to know her name, neither of them usually cared to get to know each other in the five to ten minutes they’d spend together and she didn’t care much either if a Benjamin, George, Richard or William bent her over a chair or pressed her against a wall.

“Lola”, he repeated, and her name sounded strange, like a song, a seesaw of syllables, coming from his mouth.

“ _Lady_ Lola.”

“Enchantée, _milord_.”

Visibly content, he told her that was enough talk and kissed her, gently and enduring as he continued to hold her.

After a while, Lola had involuntarily dozed off, she felt how the bed shifted, the inconceivably dulcetly warm body next to her gone.

Some knocking could be heard on the outside on the little wooden board that served as a makeshift doorbell.

“Colonel Simcoe?”, a stranger’s voice asked shakily, a little embarrassed. One of his men, Lola mused as she (somewhat disappointed) watched him dress and reach into the pockets of his coat, from whence he procured a small leather purse.

“Talents six is the usual rate, isn’t it?”, he asked with the same sharp froideur in which he had answered the man outside.

She nodded, pulling the thin blanket up to her shoulders.

“Twelve then”, he announced all business-like, “for your troubles and the dress”, and counted twelve coins into his hand, which he then left on the chair where only moments before, his coat had hung and left.

“Farewell, Lord Simcoe”, she said just before he could open the flap of the tent.

“Lady Lola”, he reciprocated the greeting in a low voice, eager not to let his man outside hear him, nodded briskly in her direction and then was gone.

This man.

Was there anyone in this world who could make sense of him? How could the same man be like an April day, warm and inviting at one moment, and cold and dangerous at the next?

She would have to get a new dress, and twelve shillings was twice what her last one had cost. If he'd destroy that one however, she'd be after him with his own bayonet in earnest. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have tried to figure out how much Simcoe is paying Lola as I've never heard "talent" as a term for a British coin. I tried to research this, but got to no end- after Chalremagne's re-introduction of the Roman coin system into Western Europe, "talentum" could mean "pound"- but Lola would hardly be paid 12 pounds for her services.  
> A study of one copy Harris's List from 1789 (eight years after the story is set, so prices may have varied), the famous compilation of female London sex workers, left me with the impression that the lowest price among those “better” sex workers was one pound, one shilling (a guinea).  
> These ladies lived comfortably compared to Lola and depending on their “accomplishments”, e.g. dancing-skills or being good singers, they could earn more.  
> However, we are in a colonial setting and Lola is not some reasonably well-off white Englishwoman whom a gentleman would take into keeping or show off to his circle of friends.  
> Given her living-conditions, I think it is safe to assume she would earn considerably less than a guinea, which was a lot of money at the time- and twelve pounds, which is more than some people would earn in a whole year, seems just utterly unlikely.  
> What I could imagine is, as he had silver coins in his hand, that it might have been shillings. Twelve talents/shillings, the amount he pays her in the story, is still quite a lot (take into account that one pound is made up of twenty shillings and army pay was pretty bad even in the upper echelons).  
> If any of you happens to know more than I do, please enlighten me in the comments!


	3. The Colonel

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lord Simcoe brings Lola a new (and very useful) accessory for her tent, Lola tries to make sense of her most curious customer and lastly, the infamous scene with the bayonet- enjoy!

The truth was, she didn’t. Making sense of Lord Simcoe was a task equally fruitful as if she were to attempt draining York City harbour with a leaky old piss pot. And, if she was being honest to herself, she liked him that way, mysterious, enveloped in a coat of melancholic darkness even when fully naked, which billowed behind him with every step he took- even if he sometimes vexed her and spurned her curiosity, too.

Sometimes, she asked herself if she was the only one who could see that, the darkness, sadness even, the intrigue that surrounded him.

His men, she’d come to find out, feared and respected him in equal measure; while he was no martinet, he was strict and putting so much as one’s little toe over a line he had drawn could put one’s life into terrible danger.

He’d been rough with her too, but that was different.

Whenever he’d a coin to spare, or so it seemed, he wanted to see her and over time, Shy John of days gone by was as passé as certain plays or songs that didn’t make the stage any longer.

Her intriguing Lord Simcoe, who had previously exhibited a love for soft (boring) romance and his tendency to be exhilaratingly strong and commanding when teased a little too much was growing more exciting a prospect with every day.

Not only because he meant a steady flow of generous income; for her own pleasure (which at this point she almost expected whenever he was with her and was unafraid to take it from him if necessary), she had brought him over the edge of composedness a few times to make him take her like there was no tomorrow, angry, punishingly, pounding into her while making sure she was getting off of it, at which he mocked her in a lowly, growling tone, thinking he’d won a great victory having made her like it when in truth, she had played him like a puppet made of an old sock.

Not that she’d let him know, though. Men, Lola had come to realise over the years, liked to think they wield all the power, which makes them biddable and easy to handle. As long as a man lives the illusion of being in command, he never is.

Recently, he had grown more willing to try things, new things. One day, he had two of his men accompany him to her tent- at first, she’d thought he wanted them to participate, too, or watch as they would have her, but then her eyes had fallen on the object they’d been carrying, an oblong shape like a picture frame, obscured by a tarp.

“Here”, he’d ordered them and made them lean their cargo against a tent pole.

“You can leave now.”

In the men’s eyes, she’d read bewilderment and bemusement, likely stemming from the fact they didn’t have any interest in knowing what their superior did in his time off or with whom  and especially not how, yet these men knew better than to comment on the situation or say anything at all and left as quickly as they had come.

Like a magician unveiling a magic trick, Lord Simcoe had stridden over to the veiled thing and theatrically tore the tarp off it.

A mirror, about the length of her body, a little old and spotty in places with a crack running through the breadth of it, but still useable as she discovered taking one step closer.

“For you”, Lord Simcoe had explained, whispering into her ear, “I thought you may enjoy it.”

While he had said that, he had stood behind her, bent down to brush her ear with his lips as he talked, his hands sneaking around her body and possessively gliding over her breasts and the apex of her thighs, making her more than hot and wet in anticipation of what he had promised her.

Indeed, the mirror had been positioned very cleverly and could be viewed from the bed.

Smirking in order not to let John know of her own anticipation of what he had in mind and allowing him the illusion of being in control when she already, secretly, planned for achieving her own pleasure, she watched as he undressed himself, meticulously as always.

To her surprise, he stopped at his weapons and coat, only ridding himself of his belt before he opened his breeches, freeing himself, and settled down opposite the mirror on the bed.

“I see what you have in mind”, Lola could not help but comment and was almost done climbing onto his lap (the way things looked, she wouldn’t need to perform much perfunctory work on him), but was stopped.

“Ah-ah”, he scolded her and pushed her off him. “Strip.” He sat there, still fully clothed, leering as she did as he bid her.

“No”, came his next command, “ turn around and face the mirror.”

As her robe fell to the floor, she could see herself and behind her Lord Simcoe, who was watching and staring at her mirror image.

It was a curious feeling; she’d never seen herself like this before, the entirety of her body, which stood in such a stark contrast to John, Lord Simcoe, who was fully clothed and watching her unabashedly.  As she was set on undoing her stockings, she was instantly ordered to keep them on.

“Those remain. They look delightful on you.”

John had risen behind her, pressing his body against hers, making her feel how hard he was already.

Next he sat down again, beckoning her to follow him in what he was doing by sitting down on his thighs with her back to him. In order to angle her to his satisfaction, he leaned forward, pulling her legs apart so that they were held in this position by his own before he began slowly grinding against her while fondling her breasts.

“Yes, that’s it”, he growled as she moaned audibly, both because it came to her naturally anyway and to encourage him in what he was doing, “and don’t close your eyes, keep them on the mirror.” There was no comparable experience for her to liken what was happening to and watching Lord Simcoe pleasure her so shamelessly, taking obvious enjoyment from the fact she was writhing, aching for him to finally get to it, tripled her need and desperation to be granted release.

Frustrated, she tried to touch herself, but her hand was slapped away.

“My, how wanton you are for me”, he chuckled, “no more of that. I decide what you get.”

Reaching between her legs, he made her watch as he stroked her slowly, building a most intense tension up in her gut but just when she thought she was done for, he withdrew his hand from her folds, causing her to groan with frustration.

“Soon, my dear”, he said in his cutting little voice that always sounded like he was mocking the person he was talking to. His own breath came now more laboured from the stimulation of her naked, writhing on top of him and at last, he beckoned her to raise herself to her knees somewhat, finally allowing his length to slip into her, thrusting eagerly as she lowered herself down on him.

That was it, she was done for- with or without the hands now back at her nipples, rolling them between his fingers.

“Lord Simcoe-“

Eagerly, she reached back and grabbed for his hair, not caring how rough she was doing so, clawing for strands of ginger while arching her neck to receive him for a kiss.

At feeling her hands grabbing for his hair, he sighed, not plaintively because it hurt, but appreciatively. Even while swept away by a wave of pleasure, Lola noted and vowed to remember this new piece of information for later.

When they were finally done after several rounds of testing the properties of Lord Simcoe’s new favourite toy, she allowed herself to lie back and find some brief respite in his embrace.

Funny how he was always all tame afterwards, an oversized puppy dog, whereas he could be rough and commanding during their encounters, every inch the proud officer. Not that she didn’t like it, but it made her wonder- sometimes, all he wanted was to be very gentle with her throughout, causing her to ask herself if this was what people called “making _love_ ” whereas on other occasions, he took her quickly, roughly, enjoying to make her suffer prolonged passion without granting her relief for long periods of time.

Although he’d evidently liked it, he had never asked for the thing again they’d done with the blindfold, she being ultimately in command. Perhaps it had to do with the fact that he was too embarrassed to ask her for it, or he felt ashamed as in his world of knights and dames, the knight should be brave and commanding, the possibilities were endless.

She didn’t mention it as it was not really important- she’d get her part of the fun and earn some money by’t, so why complain? Still, she was captivated by him, by these countless contradictions and how so many could have come to accumulate in one single man, asking herself countless questions when once more his head rested on her stomach and she stroked his hair, sometimes adding some praises of his performance earlier, which he seemed to like particularly.

“Your little present for me, where did you get it?”

“Nowhere of importance.” Lola could tell from his eyes _nowhere of importance_ meant he’d likely not bought it but procured it using his station and his little hissy voice, having forced the last owner to part with it more or less willingly.

Chuckling, she vowed she would keep his little treasure hidden under the bed in order to keep the precious object out of sight to prevent it from being stolen and would only take it out for him.

He was pleased and announced she better be prepared to take it out again, soon.

The next time they met however, Lola first saw him from afar. She’d been speaking to some other redcoat, not as handsome (or well-paid) as John Simcoe, but making a clean and friendly general impression when she saw the tall, red-headed man coming her way.

-That was until he stopped to speak to some other woman in a dirty red dress with scraggly hair and wrinkles. She was old and looked probably older than her actual age given life in the Holy Ground was not a bed of roses (or rather one where the thorns were still attached) .

Anger and jealousy rose within her. What could he possibly want from that person? The way he was looking her over left nothing to be doubted, but still, he couldn’t possibly-

“Ay! Lord Simcoe!”

She couldn’t help herself. Before she’d known it, she had pushed the soldier boy away and made herself known to John, whose head turned in her direction. Within seconds, he was with her.

He was too good a catch to share with any other and she was positively offended he had even considered lying with that scraggly old scarecrow, but that was something that could be addressed later, under very different circumstances.

“Lady Lola”, he greeted her. His voice was soft, like velvet and indicated to her he would be needing gentleness tonight. Sometimes, it astonished her how well she’d come to know him.

“Care to see my castle?”

“I do, tonight. All night if you can keep it free.”

All night! King Croesus (or should she say Coe-us?) had come into some money then? Soldiers, even the higher-ups, weren’t paid to well.

“Well now”, she breathed coyly in answer to this exuberance. He’d never stayed the night before.

Smirking, he produced a weighty leather purse from his pocket and held it out to her.

“Pretty please?”

She loved it when he said that.

“See you at six.”

For a moment, she held his gaze before he walked on, pretending he had just completed a business transaction, which was in truth so much more- she could not help but feel a smile creep onto her own face, thinking of her curious cull, the formidable Lord Simcoe.

Still, the confusion as to why he had looked that other woman over remained until he came to see her that night.

He was punctual, entered her tent with the first chime of the bell, not a second early or later.

“Milord”, she grinned as he came straight for her and enwrapped her in an embrace that came with a very long kiss.

“I must leave soon, Lola.”

“Leave? Are you going to war?”

“No, not just yet. Afterwards, but I’ll return. Enough talk.”

She’d been right, whatever his cryptic mission, he needed patience and gentleness tonight and she was willing to give it. Over time, time spent with him to be precise, she had become rather spoilt, expecting him to do things that gave her pleasure whenever she liked it and which in most cases were not of the “the knight lies with his virgin lady for the first time” variety, though even then, he saw to it she spent, too.

Predictably, he slowly unclothed her and then himself (to her joy, he had let go of his slow, long-winded routine of meticulously folding everything, likely because he had finally realised he was wasting good time he had paid for and could spend fucking her), gathered her in his arms and laid her on the bed before taking her slowly and with tender deliberation. It wasn’t unpleasant, but he could do more than that, more exciting things, she knew and thought of herself in his lap, or rather the mirror image she had seen, his long, strong fingers thrusting in and out of her in perfect synchronisation with his thumb stroking her little nub.

Perhaps work had done it to her having slept with so many men and most of them drunk or very sure of themselves and their performance in bed, but she liked the more imaginative things. If she’d ever spread her legs for a man without accepting payment, he’d better be pretty damn imaginative. Perhaps she’d even marry him if he showed her something she didn’t know yet, she thought and inwardly chuckled at the impossibility of it.

Afterwards, he required some cuddling, to be shown what a brave, intoxicating man he was- the look on his face when she kissed him was priceless. He was far, far gone, certainly not in this tent anymore. In his mind, the two of them probably laid on a rug made of the skin of a unicorn in front of a roaring fire in a castle in the cold and rain-wet country he had come from, his castle, and she was some noble lady he had snatched from the claws of a hungry dragon.

Remembering what he had said, she recalled his mission to him when he was just about to fall asleep, blissfully content with her lying across his chest.

“You have to leave and you already paid for the whole night”, she kissed him in between words, teasingly stroking his wonderfully soft chest hair in order to make him realise what he’d miss if he should really go now. Not that she’d complain about a paid night of lying in and sleeping all by herself, but she didn’t mind his company.

“Some odds and ends to tie up”, he replied in a curious tone, “but stay here and I’ll be back momentarily.”

His business wasn’t hers and perhaps it was good not to know what he was doing. She couldn’t afford trouble and after everything she’d heard about her curious cull from others, it was advisable to stay out of his way as far as his occupation and his raging temper were concerned though truth be told, she found that made him even more interesting to her as it further highlighted the stark contrast between the big, strong man he liked to play and the biddable, affectionate creature snuggled close to her after an hour or two in her tent.

“You are a curious man, John”, she chuckled against his lips, “and I wonder if you’ll miss me.”

His answer came as somewhat of a surprise.

“So do I”, he said of all things he could have like “absolutely” or “fret not, I’ll be back before you’ll even notice I am gone”. It didn’t fit his romantic inclinations- and then, it suddenly did.

But before she could ponder on it further, he went on: “you know my odds and ends can wait?”

Ah, that sounded more like him.

He rose and poured himself a cup of the cheap wine she kept as refreshment for her customers before he turned to her once again: “can you read, Lola?”

No one had ever bothered teaching her and she considered it to be rather ignorant of someone like him, a well-bred polite little boy having most likely been educated by a private tutor a rich mama or papa had paid for him or in one of these prestigious old schools they send their sons to in England, to assume reading was a skill everyone had.

She hadn’t, of course not- why would she have needed it? She’d worked on a plantation as a child and nobody had cared if she could read or not- or indeed that she existed beyond helping her mother and the other slaves as good as her young age allowed. She was not supposed to be a pretty little lady, but work hard in the field, where she didn’t need to be able to sing, dance or read like the master’s daughters.

Sometimes, she wondered if there would be any good in learning it, but then she was too old as most people learned it when very young and besides, it still was not something she needed in her daily life- she could count, calculate and prided herself of her quick mental arithmetic skills, or that was at least as she had heard some impressionable milk-faced soldier laddie call it when she had charged him for a few things he’d broken in his youthful wildness.

Besides, while Lord Simcoe could read books, she could read something far more useful than symbols on paper to make her way in the world:

“I can read men.”

She gave him a challenging look, inviting him to ask the question burning like fire on his lips:

“What do you read in me?”

Invited to tell him what she had long thought, she looked him straight in the eyes to assure him of her honesty: “sadness, I think. You are a man who only shows one side to the world, that hard side, and keeps another hidden away.”

Curious man. He probably thought his facial expression was unreadable, but it wasn’t, not to her. He looked wounded, trying to disguise the fact from his features, but that didn’t work. She had been right.

“When one values strength, one is drawn to it in others, an ally, a foe, even a lover.”

 _E_ _ven a lover_ \- for one moment, she felt compelled to correct him, she wasn’t his lover, even if she pretended to be; she was his whore and he paid her well for every single time he slept with her, paid her for pretending she was his lover, but decided not to. Not because she was afraid of him or anything but out of pity.

John was lonely; that was the reason why he befriended a whore, why he needed her to be so nice to him, and why in return he was so tender with her. And how couldn’t he be? The steely colonel didn’t have any friends and probably told himself that friends, like mercy or clemency were the weaknesses of lesser people. As a fighting machine, he did not need it. Strength. _Of course_.

Even with her he was not completely honest, and she’d seen him stripped fully naked more than once.

It was time he did the same with his soul, too, to let go of who he was, let go of the control he thought he needed so much, over his men and over her when he held her down and hooked her legs over his shoulders or took her in front of the mirror.

And she knew exactly what he needed- she’d read it in his face, his words, his body.

Preparing herself for what they’d do soon-ish and he didn’t know yet about, she sauntered over to him, well aware how she was almost tiny in comparison to the ginger giant before her.

Briefly, she recalled things she had heard whispered in hushed tones behind his back, rumours that he could kill single-handedly and that he knew no mercy and had a lust for blood and rage that even outdid the roman emperor Nero (a really, really unsavoury character judging from what she’d seen in a play once) but wiped these things off her mind. He was dangerous, she’d known that the first time she’d let him into her tent. And that for her was part of the thrill.

The woman Lord Simcoe had come to know was an expert worker in her trade, one who even liked him as a customer, and a little bit as a person, too. The man had no reason to expect anything from her other than what they’d established between each other so far.

Perhaps he thought she’d kiss him again, or admire his furred chest (men were such vane creatures) when she lazily let her fingers trail upwards through the reddish thicket to his neck as suddenly, she tightened her hand around his neck and momentarily restricted his airflow, pressing uncomfortably down on his Adam's apple.

In a dark voice she asked him if he trusted her and his almost immediate answer (“I barely know you”) was both the right one (he really didn’t and if he did, perhaps he would not want her to cradle him to sleep in her arms at times) and one that stung a little as well.

“Trust me anyway.”

The cup he had still held in his hand thudded to the floor.

And trust her, he did.

“You are mine, now”, she said to him as she led him back to the bed by the hand, “sit”.

He obeyed, just like the good little puppy dog she sometimes thought of him as would.

“Are you willing to try something new? Something _depraved_?”

His consent was given with a soldierly nod that betrayed some of his anticipation when she retrieved a length of rope from under the bed.

Beckoning him to lean against the tent pole (strategically placed there, of course), she took his arms and tied them behind his back.

“No blindfold this time?”, he tried to make light of the situation, gain the upper hand, but he couldn’t win.

“No. I want you to see what I’m doing.”

With one hand, she reached between his legs and stroked him, giving him a taste of what he’d get if he would be good and obedient.

She could see the appeal of watching another person lost in pleasure but unable to do anything about it themselves. He was delightful, moaning, trying to restrain his exclamations.

“Wait.”

Oh, she had something very special in mind for him.

With a fiery look in his eyes that spoke of his anger at being left without his need being attended to following her every step, she sauntered to the chair with his clothes and weapons.

His bayonet, a serrated blade, gleamed dangerously in the dull torchlight when she drew it from its sheath, a martial metaphor for her trade. Smiling to him or herself, it didn’t matter anyway, she showed it to him as she settled on top of him, unmoving.

Already feeling his considerable girth stretching her was sweet and brought a feeling akin to an itch wanting to be scratched on, but she kept herself from using him for her own pleasure for now- she had something special in mind for him.

Her big, big mountain of a colonel, now smaller than she, looked up to her as if to show defiance. Clearly, he didn’t know what to think, what was to come. And that was delightful.

Apparently, after a few seconds, an inkling why she might have brought the bayonet trickled through his brain, because he suddenly said: “I should warn you this blade brought death to many and pain enough to make others long for it.”

“But it has never brought fear to you.”

“I’m not afraid.”

These were nothing but the words of a young child dared by his older siblings to go into the darkness of the cellar alone for a bet. The blade did bring fear to him, she could tell.

“Because you trust that I won’t hurt you.”

-This was _exactly_ what she was going to do.

“Because I trust that if you do you know the consequences would be fatal.”

A little bold of him to threaten her, she found, while he was tied up and at her mercy. What was he to do? Hiss angrily at her while his own bayonet found its way through his ribs and into his heart?

And anyway, she’d seen far worse in her life than an angry colonel whose bark was worse than his bite. Far, far worse- and lived. She’d take that chance.

“Maybe I’ve seen so much I don’t fear consequences.”

In this moment, she allowed the tip of the silver blade to penetrate his skin, drawing a red line onto the left side of his chest.

He bit his lip and closed his eyes, hissed and writhed in pain, eager not to show any of it. Yet there was something else to his reaction, too, pleasure, unhinged and primal.

“Does it feel good to take your armour off and put yourself in my hands?”, she asked, already knowing the answer before he said yes. She didn’t put the bayonet away just yet, loving to let the threat of it linger between them and bring the tension between them to a new precipice.

Perhaps now, in such a state of rawest honesty, she would finally find the answers she was curious about.

“You don’t take me as other men do. You want me to feel something, you want to see just a little bit of love in my eyes.”

When he did not respond by anything but a groan elicited by her gyrating hips, rolling his length even deeper into her, she further encouraged him “don’t deny it, don’t fear it”, wanting to push him over the ultimate edge, make him forget who he was for one moment, just to see the true John, Lord Simcoe behind the façade of the colonel, but talking to him was utterly useless as his breath came quickly and he seemed beyond the point where he was able to utter a coherent sentence, enraptured and chasing after blissful release.

He had been very good and thus deserved a little reward- with deft fingers that did not hold a sharp weapon for the first time, she cut through the rope, which caused his hands to fly up to her arse and grab it hard and possessively, controlling the mutual rhythm they were building up on their path to mutual pleasure.

However he was doing it didn’t matter, Lord Simcoe, feeling him inside and beneath her was enough to at last force her to surrender to pleasure and nothing else, too, swept all thoughts except Lord Simcoe off her mind.

“Say my name”, she gasped, already very close. He was hers, hers entirely and she wanted him to speak the name of the woman who defeated him, the Queen who had subjugated him to her rule, “say it, say it-“

“Colonel Simcoe?”

This was certainly not how she had planned this night to go, there hadn’t been any Queen’s Rangers involved.

Why did they need him now, at night, anyway?

Were his mystery “odds and ends to tie up” involved? Regretfully and seething with pleasure not gained, she rose and allowed him in turn to dress.

Her face communicated her frustration and anger to him while he avoided her eyes as he put his clothes back on to follow the man outside to godknowswhere.

“I hope to be back”, came his farewell. His eyes met hers for a split second; when before they had been darkened with pleasure, now there was another darkness in them, one Lola knew she wouldn’t like were she the recipient of it.

Ignoring him as a measure of punishment, she let him go. As soon as the flap of her tent had closed, she lay back on the bed and spread her legs- the frustration was too much to bear and so, she had to make do with herself. Rubbing herself at a quick pace, she thought of the colonel with her eyes closed to enhance the solitary experience.

Even when she achieved what the soldier had interrupted, the feeling wasn’t nearly as satisfying and all-consuming compared to what she knew her curious colonel could do- and would have done, had not this bloody idiot spoiled everything.

Spent and glistening with sweat, she lay there alone and listened into the darkness.

If she wasn’t much mistaken, she could hear his voice not too far in the distance, yet too indistinct to make out individual words.

If he’d come back, she vowed, Lord Simcoe would have to pay dearly for the interruption. She had her methods.  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter and the one following it are/will be heavily based (that is to say whenever there is a little plot in between) on a theory I have regarding season 4 episode 6 and Simcoe’s complicated murder-plot.  
> My theory is Simcoe never planned to kill Lola (which obviously does not make “merely” claiming he will morally defensible).  
> Let’s look at what happens:  
> When Simcoe walks down Lola’s street, he is shown looking to the left at a scraggy woman with strawy blonde hair in a red dress. He keeps looking her over and the woman makes a few flirtatious gestures- enter Lola.  
> Lola appears to be offended and calls him over, pushing a random potential customer away.  
> Now, the first woman looks fundamentally different from Lola, white, blonde, less good-looking and a lot older, which could easily be a deliberate choice made to encourage the audience to question why Simcoe would even consider her when he could spend the night with Lola, especially that given his love interests on the show, we have come to learn he likes dark-haired and dark-eyed women.  
> Later, when his hitmen calls Lola “that whore of yours”, Simcoe corrects him, insisting she be called “Miss Lola”. Simcoe has no qualms calling people he does not like or value exclusively by their surname, yet in both the cases of Anna and Lola he refers to them as Mrs and Ms respectively.  
> Besides, “that whore of yours” also implies Simcoe has seen Lola more than once, so often in fact his men know about her and associate her with him.  
> Perhaps the strongest argument is that he put his life in her hands. She could have stabbed him, but he trusted her with his weapon. He trusts her more than he trusts his own men. He says it himself, he values her strength, which is probably the nicest thing he can say about any person. 
> 
> In my view, it was Simcoe’s plan to hire a random sex worker to frame in Hewlett’s murder, but Lola unexpectedly came in the way, by calling him and making it impossible for him to ignore her.  
> Being somewhat enamoured with him, he agrees to spending the night at her tent- without the intention to kill her. He also tells her he will return after having finished his business, which of course could be a ruse to make her feel safe and keep her unsuspicious of what he is about to do, but given his apparently relatively frequent meetings with her and the almost intimate way in which they talk and interact suggest to me he has genuine feelings for her (a good portion of them lust) and he is indeed intent on coming back for round two of the night, not to kill her in a ridiculously complicated murder-plot.
> 
> Some of the dialogue was taken from series 4, episode 6.


	4. John

Lola lay alone on the bed, rolling herself into the pleasantly warm spot where John had sat before and pulled the blanket up to her shoulder, listening into the darkness.

Straw tickled her left lower leg where a particularly strong stalk had won the fight with the threadbare fabric covering the filling and peeked through a hole, pricking her.

Sighing, she shifted and buried her head in the cushion that had supported John’s head- and that of so many others before. It didn’t smell good, was too used and old to be really clean anymore despite her best efforts and like the rest of her bedding told tales of years of ill use through its stains and smells, which she tried to counter (despite what them higher-ups might think, people like her liked themselves and their homestead clean and well-kept, too, not only because cleanliness appealed to customers but simply because it was a basic human inclination and need, only out here it was far less easy to maintain than in one of the stone townhouses with an army of maids in white lace caps armed with feather dusters) by washing everything that could be washed as frequently as possible.

Over the years though, some stains and the faint smell of _people_ had never really gone away; at the same time making her long for a real bed of the sort she had only heard about in fairy tales and accounts by some of her sisters who’d formerly worked as housekeepers and maids who had been thrown out for a vast array of more or less justified reasons. She’d never have that, though and found comfort in what she had, the familiarity of it and the knowledge that this bedstead was hers and hers alone.

His voice, soft and low in the distance, wiped any thought of going to sleep away; he was not far. What was he doing? There were two other voices with him, voices she did not know or recognise, perhaps some of his men, but what business did they have at such an ungodly hour? Immediate orders or some such?  
Unlikely; besides, he was a man who attracted darkness.

Although she knew it would be prudent to stay away from whatever he might be up to, at last her curiosity won and she rose in order to peek through the flap of the tent.

The light of the nearby fire attracted with its warmth some shadowy souls, some whores without customers, some men who looked like their trade wasn’t one of honest work like the flame of a candle does moths.

In the firelight, a few yards away, the blazing copper of John’s hair was unmistakeable.

He was gesturing to the other man, apparently eager to get their business transaction or whatever they were at over with before he turned and saw her.

Lola did not even think of pulling the flap shut and hiding, pretending she hadn’t looked, she wasn’t a little girl. She stood by her decision and the way he was winking at her, suggestively producing his bayonet before slipping it back into its sheath, told her that he hadn’t minded at all, on the contrary, he was looking forward to the rest of the night he had paid for.

It took him only a few bold strides with his long and (impossibly well-muscled) legs until he was by her side again, standing in the entrance of her tent.

Ushering him inside, she pulled the flap closed again in order to preserve what little warmth the tarps could hold, which was beneficial to both her work and her customer’s well-being.

“You’re back already”, she purred, peeling his coat from his shoulders and exposing a small line of red on his waistcoat where the blood from her wound, still fresh, had seeped through. The wound was barely more than a scratch, but had bled a little more than she would have anticipated.

For his standards, he’d ventured outside half-dressed, his cravat stuffed into his pocket and his shirt open at the front, which added quite enticingly to his air of roughness.

She almost liked him better like this than when he was dressed to perfection, every inch the model officer.

“Now, what was that business that took you way too long, hm?”, she asked as she undid the buttons of his waistcoat one by one, pushed it off his shoulders and then continued to untuck his shirttails, which she did by reaching inside his breeches and fondling him as she worked, meeting his approval as the little sounds he made told her. Her other hand crept beneath his shirt and found the wound she had made before. Their eyes locked and with a grin, she traced it with one fingernail, reopening it in the process.

John mewled and tilted his head back in a mixture of pleasure and pain, sinking one of his large, strong hands in her hair to pull her in for another kiss.

“Please”, he gasped breathlessly as she stroked him with a little more pressure than before and immediately reconnected his lips to hers as if he was desperately reliant on her kiss like he was on air to breathe.

“ _More_.”

In no time, he had rid himself of his breeches and stockings and once more towered over her, still vaguely threatening and utterly intoxicating at the same time with nothing more on him than he had worn at his birth.

“If you are good, I might”, she said airily and gave him a little push to beckon him lie down, but not before she had helped him out of his shirt.

“Now, hands up.”

He was very eager to comply, which once more affirmed Lola in her guess that he, the strong, somewhat unsettling commander yearned to for once be led rather than lead himself; it was a common thing with powerful men actually, but judging him by his looks and what she’d heard of him before, she’d never have guessed he’d be one of the sort- if he could even be counted among their number, seeing as he could also be very commanding, her curious Lord Simcoe.

With his hands tied to the post and completely at her mercy, he looked so very beautiful.

With one knee on either side of his hip, she ground herself against him as they kissed again and Lola suggestively ran her fingernails through the ginger thicket on his chest.

The bulge in his breeches evidently increasing, she rose- he would not be allowed to come just yet.

Lazily, she slipped her gown off. John’s instincts clearly told him to struggle against the bonds that held him when he saw her like this, ready to take her.

John had wanted the bayonet and he would get it but before, she wanted him absolutely mad for her.

On a provocative whim, she brushed his clothes off the chair and onto the floor, almost cat-like. As she did so, she kept her eyes on him and was rewarded with a flicker of momentary anger that changed to lust accompanied by a longing moan as he, head turned to the side, watched her seat herself on the chair with her legs wide open and presenting herself thusly to his gaze. Slowly, she began to touch herself, first teasing her breasts until both nipples were achingly stiff before finally allowing one hand to creep between her legs.

Doing it herself was by far not as exciting as profiting from John’s skilful surprises, but having him watch her and knowing he could not do anything about his own arousal that, unattended, had probably reached excruciating levels, added an undeniable thrill to what she was doing.

Besides, a little lesson in how it’s done could never go amiss on any man, for the better of her sisters in the profession, long-suffering wives and womankind in general.

He was writhing and whimpering- and she hadn’t even done what he had asked her to do yet. Without granting herself the sweet release of pleasure, she rose and collected the bayonet from the floor, unsheathing it.

Without doing what he wanted her to, she set the tip of the bayonet below his chin, thus forcing him to look up at her.

He did so with a hungry expression on his face that revealed a hint of fear when she trailed down to his neck, then to his chest, where she lingered each time for the fraction of a second, allowing the vague illusion of a threat to his life loom between them, before she let the weapon in her hands trail even further down-

This time, he could barely conceal his obvious nervousness, Lola noted contently when at last the bayonet’s cold steel brushed down the entirety of his length. Brave soldier that he was, he kept his legs still, but it was evident he was thinking of using them to shield his most manly part from certain danger.

She could not help but chuckle. After all, this was what he looked for with her, someone who’d do things for him and with him without judging him and that others wouldn’t even dare to think of.

“My brave soldier”, she praised him and delivered a perfunctory kiss to the tip of his prick. There weren’t many men she’d willingly do this for, given many of her customers were far from appealing or at least as cleanly as Lord Simcoe, but he’d done the same for her several times and with him, it didn’t feel as odd, disgusting or degrading as she had experienced using her mouth on other men. Doubtlessly experienced as she was, she could manage overcoming her dislike of taking a man into her mouth if she had to and the cull paid well, with her Lord Simcoe however, there were no negative emotions when she tormented him further as she took him in, grazing his prick with her teeth, threatening to do with them what she hadn’t done with the bayonet.

Twitching below her, he exclaimed her name so loudly she was sure it would serve as a rather effective advertisement of her skills outside in the street.

Having brought him to the painful edge of bliss (and unable to hold her own desire back for much longer), Lola rose, bayonet still in hand and climbed up to lower herself onto him.

John’s hips bucked eagerly as she met his impatient thrusts and for a moment or two, she allowed him to chase after his pleasure but then pressed her palm against his chest:

“Stay still or I can’t do it.”

Immediately, he went still beneath her except for a slight tremble of which Lola could not tell if it showed anticipation or fear. Gyrating her hips somewhat to keep him right on the edge, Lola made a second shallow cut just above the first.

His eyes rolled back in his head until only the whites were visible and he moaned lustfully even though the expression on his face was one of unadulterated pain.

“That’s for being late”, she whispered against the remainder of his left ear, “for leaving me so long.”

He bit his lip to battle the pain I reply, sucking air in through his gritted teeth, which he then opened to say:

“More. Again. Please.”

Well, he’d wanted it. This time, she cut him just below the nipple, causing him to thrash about against his bonds and groan in pain while still aware she was denying him the precipice of pleasure.

Droplets of tears from forcefully shutting his eyes in an attempt to brace against the stinging pain of being cut formed in their corners as they found hers again, looking up at her with meek imploringness.

“ _More_. Deeper, this time.”

If this was what he wanted, Lola tried to reassure herself and set the bayonet to his chest for a fourth time and applied a little more pressure than before. This new wound was a little deeper now and this time, Lord Simcoe permitted himself a true, unsuppressed exclamation of pain for the first time.

Blood flowed from his wounds, not very much but enough to cause Lola concern for her bedclothes and above all, John’s sanity.

“Again. Use pressure.”

Now it was Lola’s time to tremble, he could not possibly want her to-? If he’d be dead by the end of the night, she’d get hung. Besides, she didn’t really want to bloody her bedclothes too much, either.

With great precision and growing uneasiness on her part, she cut him for the fifth time, a little deeper still.

“Yes, more.”

“You cannot be serious-“

“I deserve it, to feel pai- hm- ah-”, he then pressed through his teeth and she could read in his face that he meant what he said- there was a pain in his eyes that had nothing to do with having been cut, a distinct darkness that appeared to be his constant companion, but showed even more prominently now than on most days. Coupled with the tears streaming down the sides of his face, Lola asked herself what he thought he had done to _deserve_ , as he put it, pain, which at the same time worked as some sort of release for him.

“I deserve it very much- Aaah- Yes, yes-“

And he was done for, driving his hips up and into her with great force and when Lola cut him free for the second time this night, he made sure she received her part of Eros’ spoils, too.

Their bodies thrashed against another, John’s blood warm against her skin and when he held her in his arms, he delivered her from one crest into a state of uncomfortable limbo and from there unrelentingly, mercilessly, right into a second through deft, well-timed and unceasing movement of his hips and hands.

Panting heavily, she found herself lying next to John, not knowing what to say. In all honesty, she was a little bit frightened how a person could want to have such pain inflicted on their body.

“You’re bleeding”, she said and felt a little stupid for stating the obvious. Freeing herself from his embrace, she reached for his coat on the ground and threw it over her naked form in order to cover herself a little bit from the cool air in the tent.

She opened a wooden trunk and pulled from it the old gown John had recently destroyed. As she reached for her own knife, usually used from doing things such as cutting bread and defending herself if necessary, John eyed it curiously.

“Absolutely out of the question”, she ruled quickly, knowing what he was thinking. “I just can’t use that serrated thing of yours for what I’m doing.“

Her quick fingers cut relatively even-sized strips of fabric from the ruined garment, which she then carried over to the bed. Next, she fetched her washbasin. The water in it wasn’t exactly warm, not like his in his officer’s quarters somewhere, but it would have to do.

Using a more or less square piece of fabric she had cut for exactly this purpose, she carefully dabbed away the blood with a little bit of cool water to get rid of already dried little rivulets.

John let her do as she pleased and only hissed lowly when she had touched one of his wounds with too much force.

“Hold still”, she advised him sternly when he flinched once, sitting on the edge of the bed and letting her do with him what she thought right.

He obeyed instantly and sat still like a statue for the rest of the procedure. Not even once, Lola noticed, did he look her in the eyes or talk to her as she wiped the blood off his chest.

Next she bandaged him as good as her means allowed and when she was done, he looked at her for the first time in a long while.

“You’ve got some on you, too”, was all he remarked, obviously evading the word _blood_ and reached for the basin she had previously set down on the floor beside them.

His eyes found a small piece of soap (a luxury Lord Simcoe’s generosity permitted her indulging in) and bade her fetch it. His long fingers gently pried it from hers as he next beckoned her to sit down next to him and pushed the coat off her shoulders.

“It is a little cold, do not be startled”, John said in a gentle tone, rather unnecessary given she had already felt the temperature for herself.

He soaped his hands generously (so much so she was about to scold him for wasting her precious soap) and then brought them to her chest and belly, where some of his blood had come to dry.

The water was a little too cold to be pleasant, but in combination with his hot, burning hands and the slickness of the soap, she could not have imagined anything better than feeling John washing her with the methodical precision that defined all his doings.

There was something very intimate in that alone, washing another person, dressing their wounds, however they’d come to exist. It was more intimate almost even than when they’d sport and play together, but of a very different quality of intimacy.

Almost instinctively she leaned against his bandaged side as his efforts to wash the blood away became more and more dishonest and soap-scented hands came to touch her breasts, first lightly, then with the evident intention to make her feel aroused.

Leaning her full body weight against him and tilting her head back with her eyes closed, she let him know she approved of what he was doing and gave over to his intentions for her.

Soon, when her nipples were all tingling and she could feel the tell-tale wetness between her legs increasing, a large warrior’s hand slid between her thighs where he found all the right spots she loved best while the other continued to _wash_ her, spreading cool water over her upper body with inexplicably warm hands.

What was happening now was definitively not what had happened before; he was gentle, generous and all at her service, putting his own orgasm behind her experience when he allowed her to choose how she’d like to do it and instead of fucking her roughly entered her with gentle, gradual nudges that almost drove her insane.

Although she normally had nothing against roughness, in this moment his gentleness was what she needed, much to her own surprise.

“Sit up”, she ordered him and he did so without thinking twice, thus settling her in his lap, straddling him.

She wanted to be close to him, this terrible, curious, somewhat frightening man and kiss him, look him in the eyes as the world around her erupted in bursts of light and incomprehensible intensive waves of _feeling_.

John held her up as she came down, a rock in the tempestuous sea of pleasure which had washed her back ashore.

“Why did you want me to do this?” Lola whispered into his ear, “you know, I understand what you wanted, I’d never have offered it otherwise- but _more_ and _deeper_ -“ she broke off where her comprehension failed her.

“I am all right”, he assured her and pulled her closer to him. They’d drawn the blanket over another and at last extinguished the few little lights she could afford. Through the tarps shone the light of the dying fire outside and it was almost quiet by Holy Ground standards.

John had turned to the side and held her in his arms, one hand cupping the back of her head and held her against his chest with the other supporting her back, almost like one held an infant or something very precious, careful not to let any harm come to it.

It was a good feeling, being held like that.

“You need not worry, nothing will happen to you”, he continued and reflexively held her to him with even more determination.

“That’s not what I asked”, she replied, puzzled.

“I deserved it”, he stated plainly and refused to say any more, leaving Lola alone with thoughts that contrasted the security she felt in his arms. As he said so, John made a face that reminded Lola of a child who had witnessed something very terrible but couldn’t make sense of it beyond the knowledge that what had just transpired had not been intended for their eyes and was not good at all.

“Oh John.”

“I did not intend to scare you. There are _things_ \- I am here, Lola, and I will protect you.”

Cradling her in his arms, he at last managed to lull her to sleep against all odds, leaving Lola’s body warm and relaxed. Even her mind could be persuaded to cease thinking and give over to deep, dreamless sleep.

 

 

When she awoke in the morning, she was alone. John was gone, which was totally unexpected- in fact, she’d secretly hoped he’d stay, at least say goodbye.

As she wakened, becoming gradually more receptive to her surroundings, she noticed her body had been wrapped in the blanket very tightly, the ends tucked in towards the body to keep her snug and warm. The second cushion, kept for her customers, was freshly plumped up and did not even show there had ever rested a head on it in the past few hours.

Listening into the usual morning noises, babies crying, footsteps, the occasional sound of an animal, suddenly, she felt cold.

It was no good however; she would have to rise eventually, go get some clothes washed and perhaps a customer later towards noon.

On her way out, she found another purse lying on the otherwise empty chair like the first Lord Simcoe had given her in advance; feeling it, she was astonished about its weight and then chuckled silently to herself.

Lord Simcoe was a curious man.

Throughout the day, she wondered why he was so sweet to her, not daring to give herself the obvious answer to a question she had already asked herself a few times now and abandoned it every time, turning instead to asking herself when he’d return.

He didn’t.

At first, she had believed he had simply spent too much of his pay for the week and had to economise, but when he hadn’t turned up a week later, disappointment set in.

Men were all the same after all. He’d probably found another he liked better, or gotten engaged to some pretty little miss of the local merchant-royalty and couldn’t be seen around these parts anymore.

Well, at least it had been quite something as long as it had lasted and Lord Simcoe would always provide a good story to tell to her sisters in the trade.

When a few days later however the news of impending battle in Virginia did ring throughout the streets, a sudden, unexpected pang in her heart struck Lola at the realisation where John might have gone.

Her soldier had gone to war. She thought back to when they had talked about his occupation and how he had reassured her he would always return. The truth was, many didn’t. Especially not those men who provided an easy target for the enemy; tall, broadly built, and flaming hair basically were the prerequisites for certain death in battle. If she were a rebel soldier, she’d aim straight for his broad chest.

There was not much time for her to think about him however, but his image returned to her time and time again whenever she had customers less savoury or skilled and then conjured his blue eyes up in her imagination, watching her undress before the mirror or looking her over with unabashed appreciation.

Sometimes, she also pictured him simply holding her afterwards or writhing, tied up, beneath her.

She had to stop herself. It wouldn’t do her any good, thinking of him, and she’d better acquaint herself to the thought that he was likely rotting on some battlefield, killed in action and the soft flesh of his face disfigured by waiting crows feasting upon the dead of both rebels and redcoats.

Without the soldiers, who had left regiment by regiment in the past weeks, trade had slowed; one could only hope they’d return soon- and victoriously.

 

 

Another few weeks later, Lola was sauntering along the harbour to find a customer who’d wanted to meet her there in a tavern and saw a sloop lying in the harbour, the deck busy with people. Curious by nature, she stood for a moment and watched how men were unloaded, soldiers by the looks of them; the armless, the legless, the blind and the insane, those proud wounded heroes of Virginia.

They’d lost, Lola had heard. Naturally, she was somewhat concerned what her future would be like now when the British would be gone and it was whispered Washington’s policy towards black people was even worse than the British, but that could not keep her off working; she could not allow herself the luxury to fret and faint.

The sight was terrible- the cargo of the _Bonetta_ , that was the vessel’s name, was all broken, broken men who had not a few weeks ago laughingly passed through these streets perhaps, drunk on cheap ale and rum and later on had lain in her tent or that of another Holy Ground girl. Now, they were crippled, had endured severe pain, and what for? Although no friend of British politics in general (she’d seen the worst side of it), the individual fates of the men stirred feelings of pity in her. Some of them, last came a row of stretchers, looked like it would have been more merciful to put a bullet through their heads to end their suffering rather than to put them on a ship and bring them over here. Many of them wouldn’t last long, even in York City with doctors and good care more readily available than in Virginia.

Just as the men were unloading, a small child skipped in the way of a passing cart laden with cabbage and other produce.

“The child!”, Lola exclaimed without hesitation, which in turn startled the donkey and its driver, causing the animal to hesitate for just long enough to let the somewhat frightened child escape and then took to its hind legs, spilling the contents of the cart onto the quay.

The owner furiously grabbed for the reins and tried to placate the frightened animal while simultaneously shouting abuse at Lola for having startled his donkey.

The man overseeing the unloading of the invalids unexpectedly sided with her and what ensued was a lively exchange of crude invectives and accusations against the men’s respective mothers.

At last it was agreed the dying on the stretchers could wait for a living man and his livelihood and the soldiers abandoned their cargo where they had last stood in order to collect the produce that had scattered around (or at least what remained after the donkey had trampled some of it).

This circumstance thus caused Lola to unofficially come into charge of the abandoned invalids. Well, at least she should have an eye on them for as long as it took appease the donkey-man (man-donkey).

Luckily, only two men were resting on their stretchers on the ground pretty close to each other and Lola, though never inclined to be a nurse, went over to the first man. He was quite young still, but well fed, which denoted he was an officer- the common foot soldiers hadn’t eaten properly in a long while, not even here in the city.

His head turned to the side, she had only noticed at the second glance when she looked him over more carefully- the almost boyish face framed by stringy dark hair, mouth and eyes open, was inanimate and the absence of breathing alongside the coolness of his skin told her he had been far gone even before they had bothered unloading him.

It was sad to think many, many more young lives had been extinguished on both sides. She couldn’t look at the dead boy any longer and turned to the second one, a fully grown man- even before she had glanced at his face, she knew who it was.

That _hair_.

She would always recognise it anywhere.

 _I will always return_ , these words formerly uttered with boyish bravado echoed in her mind.

With weak knees, she knelt down beside him, expecting to find him as lifeless as the dark-haired boy.

He was right, he had returned, in one piece, too (she quickly shot a glance to the right side of his head and was assured by the sight of his right ear), but more could not be said, frankly.

John was even paler than usual, translucent almost, enhanced by the effect of his hair colour.

His hair, too, had suffered; sweaty and dull, it stuck to his forehead and neck, clearly having gone unwashed for some time.

His face was the most disconcerting sight: wan and bloodless, his cheeks fallen in from having lost weight in his situation, his lips had taken the colour of the skin around them, pale and almost invisible.

Those blue eyes she had come to love so well now were sheltered behind shadow-grey eyelids, and encircled by dark rings- you’d think a skull looked at you with its dead blackness where eyes should normally be.

Cautiously, she took one of his hands, which had been placed on top of the covers at his side, indicative he hadn’t moved much or at all since being readied for transport.

To her relief and concern alike, his skin burned and was not corpse-cold.

Hot from the fever, his hand felt so utterly useless, weighty and inanimate. This was not the man she had been with several times, it couldn’t be. Whatever the body, breathing heavily with a rattling sound coming from his lungs was, it wasn’t John.

Maybe he had hypnotised her and she was to believe he had died for some reason, or was close to dying, for whatever sick reason someone would do such a thing, or maybe it was a case of mistaken identity- the way the man in the bed looked, there was no way of telling how he would look like when in a state of health, what if it wasn’t him after all? It couldn't be him. It wasn't him, never.

She stroked his hand, not knowing if she should leave or stay. She didn’t want to see such suffering and sickness, especially not that of a dying man she hadn’t even known in life, she wanted to be back out on the street, wanted some rough cull to come her way and take her, pound into her until she’d forget everything else around her, she wanted anything but playing sentry at the side of a nameless British officer-

Suddenly, the man stirred; groaning, his fevered features convulsed, a plaintive sigh escaped his mouth and his eyes opened, blinking against the bright daylight.

It took him some time to focus to understand he was looking at a person as the creases on his forehead told her. When his eyes however had attuned somewhat to their surroundings and he was looking up at her, there was, to her distress, no doubt it was him, John, almost-dead lying before her.

“Lady Lola?”, he asked, confused, his voice hoarse and weak.

“Hush”, she admonished him gently for speaking and tried not to let her own feelings surface too much. Her sadness at seeing him so wouldn’t help him.

“I have made good on my promise”, he said, totally ignoring her concern, “I did return.”

“You did.”

With one hand, she caressed his cheek.

“You foolish man.”

“Why are you here?”

“Chance, providence, whatever you like.”

He closed his eyes, probably thinking this was a dream and he at Saint Peter’s gate, but after a silent while, he seemed to notice he was, though barely, alive.

“You should kill me”, he said, opening his eyes again but evading hers as he spoke, “I almost killed you. You have a knife with you, I know that. You know how to use it.”

“No.”

Horrified, Lola shook her head.

“And you must leave, Lola. Go. Washington will not... Canada. You must promise me.”

“I promise”, she whispered in order to soothe his thoughts and he looked at peace. A dying man could not be denied his last wish, at least in lip service to make him feel better in his last moments.

“Thank you”, a stranger's voice interrupted the moment and it was the officer tasked with overseeing the unloading of the invalids.

“This one’s dead”, Lola pointed to the second stretcher and forced herself to look and sound indifferent. “He’s alive, though. Take care of him”, though she asked herself for how long exactly he would continue to be.

Without a last glance, she went in the opposite direction, back to her tent. She didn’t want to remember him like that, she could not.

Alone, unable to cry (and why, what for? A cull?) she thought about what he had said, about leaving and about some other things that would not make sense to her until many years later.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "The armless, the legless, the blind and the insane, those proud wounded heroes of (Suvla)"- line lifted from Eric Bogle's "And the Band Played Waltzing Mathilda", an anti-war song about an Australian WWI veteran thinking back to his traumatic experiences serving at Gallipoli.
> 
> Next up: the finale! A little cheesy perhaps, but what better way for a story like this to end where the plot has most of the time been more or less secondary?


	5. The Governor

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is the last chapter, everyone! Buckle up for an emotional ride as we meet Lola again in Newark, Upper Canada, in 1794...

The day had been quite busy, really, with Rangers and a few civilians coming in to refresh themselves. This place was hardly York City, but wherever there were people, especially soldiers without their wives near, they needed to be fed and watered.

By the evening, she was somewhat weary and already longing for her bed above the taproom when the door opened and a gust of cold air announced a new visitor.

Routinely, she flashed a wide smile in the direction of the door without really looking who had entered. They’d make themselves known soon enough if they wanted to drink something.

“He! No gambling here”, she shouted, and quickly walked over to the table where she had spotted two men exchanging coins over a game of dice. Mrs Colton didn’t like it, wanted to keep her tavern respectable and quite frankly, she didn’t like it either. Some people had lost everything to excessive gambling and it was best not encouraged.

Some of the higher-ups sometimes chose to drop by, too. For them, she reserved a backroom with more comfortable chairs where they could eat and drink in peace. Members of the legislative council, local landowners, that sort.

Luckily, she wasn’t dealing alone with the crowd of busy patrons and little Jane, twelve years old, greeted whoever had just entered.

The incident involving the dicers was not as easily broken up as she’d thought; one man was adamant to remain when she told him he was no longer welcome for the rest of the night, the other insisted he have his money back as there had supposedly been cheating.

It took her a quarter of an hour to forge an agreement in the interest of both parties and the tavern before both men finally left.

Sighing, she collected their by now warm jugs of ale from the table and wiped her free hand on the apron slung around her middle.

Jane walked past her and flashed her a smile.

“It’s late, you should go and sleep now.”

A pair of dark eyes rolled sky-high.

“But-“

“No nonsense, up you go. You might read a little if you want to, but not for hours.”

It had been her wish little Jane learned to read. She never had, not until she had been almost too old to learn it when her duties in the tavern had made it necessary, and despite being able to read and write for almost as long as Jane was old, her hand until this day looked unpractised and child-like. She was proud of this achievement and even prouder Jane could, too. Jane was taught by a man who’d rented a room upstairs, a scholar who had come to Canada with the interest in its native animals and plants, but had gotten stranded in Newark due to lack of funds to organise a small expedition into the wilderness to the west. An Englishman educated at one of them fancy universities they had there, he often bemoaned his fate to teach children and domestics in a droughty garret for barely more than a pittance, but was at the same time greedy for every pence he got and generally not an entirely unlikeable man if you knew how to handle him. Sometimes, he'd lend one of his books to Jane when she was tired of the bible, the only book she owned (a present by her employer), which she was very grateful for since no working person could possibly quench Jane's permanent thirst for new books.

“The guest, in the back room, he wants the best wine”, Jane shouted while untying her own apron. “He’s the curious sort.”

Lola looked up and put the jugs down thanked her and then sighed to herself. Silly, how the use of that adjective always reminded her of someone in particular, someone from a very long time ago- someone she’d seen again, from afar, a few months ago.

Governor Simcoe, that’s what they called him these days. When he’d come to Upper Canada some two years ago, she could hardly believe it, she’d watched from the backrow of a sizeable crowd (well, as sizeable as you could call a crowd in a little town like this) how a man in red regimentals rode by. She hadn’t been able to see much of him, but he appeared to be well, a little fatter than when she’d known him when he’d been, likely somewhere around his late twenties to mid-thirties, but the rigid pose on his horse and the very sharp movements he made left no doubt it was him.

Thirteen years ago, she thought he’d died but apparently, the Lord had looked out for both of them. He had a family now, she knew, she hadn’t seen them but word was he had a little girl, a little boy and his wife with him, a tiny woman half his size but twice as much of a governor than he was.

He apparently still liked to be governed, Lord Simcoe did.

Smiling to herself over such a rather good pun, she poured wine into a carafe reserved for the better guests who would dine in the back room and carried it over to said back room, a glass in the other hand.

“Sir”, she said, without really looking at him and placed both wine and glass before him, pouring some of it into the glass.

“Thank you.”

Lola froze. This voice, this voice- she lifted her eyes to study his face and despite the terribly powdered hair, the unfamiliar red uniform and his softer shape, she knew exactly who it was.

She stood before the man in the red uniform who was seated behind the table; would he recognise her, too?

Granted, it had taken her two glances to recognise him, or better still realise it was truly him, but there was no mistake, she’d know these eyes wherever she’d go.

Years had passed since they had last met. She smoothed her skirts and smiled the teasing smile she’d always given him long, long ago.

Their eyes collided, and for one second, she could see the young man he once had been.

Before she could open her mouth to say anything, he spoke:

“Lady Lola?”

Her smile broadened.

“Lord Simcoe.”

She almost curtseyed mockingly to him and then remembered that perhaps he really expected that in earnest now, big government official that he had become and so remained standing, not knowing what to do.

“Sit, sit”, he exclaimed, rose and pulled her a chair, waiting until she had sat down before he lowered himself onto his own chair again.

“Lady Lola”, he smiled and reached for her hand. “What a twist of fate that we should meet again.”

“When last I saw you, I thought you'd die.”

He gestured dismissively. “It was nothing, once I had regained some strength.”

Lola found it amusing and infuriating in equal parts how he could be so dismissive of it, given he had almost died.

“So what brings you here, Governor?”, she enquired, unwilling to recall how he had looked, corpse-pale and with lips brittle as parchment, his face more resembling a skull than a living person.

“I could ask you the same question.”

He looked at her warmly, amiably, and very curious- she noted he still hadn’t let go of her hand.

Just as he had countered so, Lola heard a low shuffle of feet outside the closed door.

Extricating her hand from the Governor’s, she quietly walked over to the door to open it with force, causing the eavesdropper outside to tumble into the room.

“Jane, what did we say about it being late? And does a young lady eavesdrop?”

“No”, Jane answered but appeared not at all affected by being scolded and instead eyed Governor Lord Simcoe curiously, her eyes resting unblinkingly on his person.

“Now that you’re here, make yourself useful, bring us some more wine and me a glass”, Lola instructed and decided to forgo any further chastisement- it was her nature to be curious, too.

“She is very sweet”, Governor Lord Simcoe said. He tried to smile, but his eyes looked sad.

“Do you have a wife? Children?”, Lola asked, knowing the answer already.

“Six in fact”, he replied instantly (and to Lola’s surprise), “we left Little Eliza, named after my wife, Charlotte, Harriet and Caroline in England for their education. Sophia and Francis are still quite small and accompanied us, but-“ he shrugged helplessly.

“Where are they?”

“With El- their mother.”

So Lord Simcoe had been domesticated. He’d likely struck an advantageous marriage for the money the girl’s parents had coughed up for the dowry and now as they had a son and heir, they’d decided they had nothing in common and separated. Maybe she had even been forced to marry him by her family. Stuff like that happened often.

Apparently he had read her thoughts directly from her mind because he continued: “We love each other, you know. Or at least did. I still do. But it didn’t go well anymore recently.”

Having delved into so heavy a topic as the failing marriage of her former favourite customer, Lola decided to be light-hearted about it: “Didn’t I teach you how to make a woman happy?”, she asked and smiled coquettishly but hesitated to touch him, not even indecently, just his face or shoulder or something. Ten years ago, she’d done so without thinking, but times had changed.

“You did”, he replied earnestly, “but it isn’t _that_.”

He blushed, blotchy red spots appearing on the still very pale skin of his cheeks. Six little ones- obviously, they’d been very prolific.

In the meantime, little Jane had returned and put two glasses and a bottle in front of her.

“Now go, sleep well.”

The twelve-year-old allowed Lola to pull her into an embrace and affectionately tuck a strand of curly dark hair, a little bit like her own but lighter and with a hint of colour that was no heirloom of their shared forefathers, underneath her cap.

Lord Simcoe eyed them with unblinking curiosity and a renewed bout of wistfulness.

“Good night, Miss Jane”, he said and rose once more in order to bid her adieu like one would a gentlewoman. Jane bowed her head and smiled, visibly feeling quite proud she was treated like an adult, like a high-born one at that.

“Thank you, sir- are you the governor?”, she asked, wide-eyed, and pointed at his uniform coat.

He chuckled benevolently.

“Indeed, I am, Miss Jane.”

Jane made a face that showed her disbelief.

“But you are a powerful man”, she then said, obviously having forgotten what she had been ordered to do, “what do you want here?”

“A drink”, John replied patiently, “and to talk to-“

He had paused, not knowing what the correct form of address was now. She could have been married or widowed in that time, for all that he knew.

“Lola will still do”, she laughed and held her hand out for him to shake, like a man’s.

“Enchantée.”

Jane let her eyes wander between them.

“You know each other?”

“Yes, we do. We met a long time ago, well before you were born, I suspect.”

It was John who let his eyes wander between them both, woman and  girl and for a second, there was a tiny crease on his forehead as if he was thinking.

“Now it’s high time for you to catch some sleep, hm?”

At last, Jane followed her instructions and left to go to sleep. She would receive lessons and additionally work in the tavern again tomorrow, so there was no use in it if she was all tired and grumpy come the next day.

When she had left, their conversation continued and Lord Simcoe told her of his recent illness, the strain of being the governor but having a legal assembly who wouldn’t do what he wanted them to put on his married life.

“Eliza” she learned, was as she had thought a wealthy heiress, but had, to her surprise, married him without the initial approval of her family and they really had been in love- until his work had come in the way of them spending time together, they’d fought and he suspected she was taking his private secretary for a lover. They’d at last confronted each other over their respective faults and shortcomings, shouted a bit and ultimately “Eliza” had packed her bags and the children and was gone for Quebec City, “visiting friends”.

Holy Mother of Christ, it sounded just like the plot of a very bad play.

“But you know, what can I do? I am ill, I am supposed to govern, I am supposed to- I serve my country and my family best as I can and nothing is ever enough”, he complained, taking a deep sip of wine.

“Give her time and pull yourself together”, she advised and tentatively reached out to touch his hand in a gesture of compassion.

Almost like more than a decade ago, his hand was very warm and the expression on his face, this wonderment at experiencing physical interaction with another person hadn’t changed either, she noted when she looked up to his face.

It was easy, really, natural. Her lips found his and she kissed him like they had done so many times before.

“I cannot”, John said, seemingly debating with himself, but the voice petitioning for restraint lost and he kissed her again, more forceful than before.

At the far end of the room, there was an old sofa, nothing special, but it was there John took her now, managing to rid himself of his coat along the way.

In the adjoining tap room, a fiddler had started to play and a bunch of men started, more or less harmoniously, to sing _The Girl I Left Behind Me_.

She could make a pretty penny if she’d go now and serve them drinks, the fiddler’s notes doubtlessly would loosen their purse strings, but she didn’t want to.

She wanted this, right now, even if some might think it wasn’t right, after all, he’d been hers first.

John’s hand, now with visibly more practice opening a lady’s garments, undid the front of her jacket and freed her breasts from the stays underneath, lavishing them with kisses so intense it felt as if he wanted to make up for the thirteen years that had passed.

One hand slipped to the hem of her dress and pulled it up, while she was quick to undo his breeches. They hadn’t much time and the door wasn’t locked, but that only added an extra thrill when John, without much of a prelude (not that she would have needed that, she’d been wet already) greedily thrust into her while she wrapped her arms around his neck and bit down on his shoulder in order to prevent herself from crying out loud, which might have alerted someone to come in and have a look.

“You’ve grown old and boring. No wonder _she_ ’s had enough”, she teased, knowing the John she had known years ago would not let this accusation slip without proving the opposite.

And she had the effect that she had wanted, for almost instantly, John’s eyes darkened with lustful ire, towering over her.

For a moment, she was sure he wanted to say something, but he didn’t. Instead, he picked her up, grabbing her around the middle and pressed her against a wall, holding her there with her back pressed firmly against the wood while he took her again, unable to do anything save to let herself fall, submit to the pleasure he knew he was causing.

Lola did an admirable job smirking at him as if she wanted to say “is this all you can do?” while he took her, even though her insides were burning, ready to give over to the overwhelming wave of pleasure building up in her abdomen.

Apparently, she was slowly growing a bit heavy for him and so, he put her to the ground, where pinned her down with her hands held high above her head.

He loved the illusion of control, and Lola, lost in this moment and the lewd pleasure of watching Governor Lord Simcoe at the service of her pleasure and her breasts, freed of their constraints, bouncing rhythmically with every thrust he made.

But, his power was not to last long; falling back into one of their old games, she kicked him in the ribs with her knee (some tricks never got old) and launched her surprise attack, in which she at last, after some struggle, had him where she wanted him. Straddling his somewhat larger frame than he had been in the past, he looked up at her, the ire gone, pleading for her mercy. He hated, he loved and he was in torment all at once. Lola had never seen him more beautiful than that and when she rode him, his wonderfully deft hands came to stroke her where she needed it most and he didn’t stop until both of them were reduced to a panting pile of sweaty limbs.

“I’ve got to go”, Lola quickly excused herself afterwards, rising from the hard wooden floor that had somehow only amplified her desire and the lewdness of the situation.

She needed to look after her patrons. The fiddler was still playing when she entered the taproom, her face flushed, her jacket not buttoned correctly and took orders.

While trading coins for drinks, she’d had a few minutes to spare and think about what just happened, how good it had felt, how comforting. She wasn’t doing this because she had to, because he paid her, she had done it because she had been happy to see him alive and well, because she still hadn’t forgotten him- and he evidently hadn’t forgotten her, either.

When a round of rum was called for, Lola realised they’d run out of rum upstairs and left the bar to go to the cellar to fetch a small keg. Practiced in lifting heavy things, the small ones were no trouble. Anything coming in middling-sized ones or right proper barrels, she had to enlist the help of men- for once, they’d be useful for something.

Down below, it was dark, but Lola’s feet knew every step. Just as she had reached the bottom of the staircase, she thought she’d heard something- the door upstairs creaking- but dismissed it. With brisk steps, she moved into the room where they stocked their beverages-

“I don’t believe we are through with one another”, John chirped as he suddenly appeared behind her, the candlestick that had stood on his table in his hand. Clever boy, he’d foregone his uniform coat to remain anonymous.

“Over a barrel”, he went on to comment while grabbing her at the hips and leaning her across one of the large, oaken vessels and pushed her legs apart with rough determination.

“Naughty, John”, she breathed as she felt his lips against her ear, growling as he came to stand behind her. She had just resolved she’d let him do it (the way things looked, he’d not lost his creative mind) when a wine-heavy voice echoed through the cellar that was soon joined by another:

_“It's of a gentleman soldier, as a sentry he did stand,_  
_And he kindly saluted a fair maid by waving of his hand._  
_So boldly then he kissed her, and passed it as a joke,_  
_He drilled her into the sentry box wrapped up in a soldier's cloak._  
_For the drums do go with a rap-a-tap-tap and the fifes did loudly play,_  
_Saying, “Fare you well, my Polly dear, I must be going away,_  
_Oh, there they tossed and tumbled till daylight did appear-_  


Oi, Gideon, where’s that barmaid? Let’s fetch us a drop for ourselves then- _”_

That of course, Lola couldn’t allow to happen.

“Hide”, she commanded and John obeyed, standing behind the door.

“Here I am. You’re strong men, aren’t you? Get me that keg over there!”

Happy to oblige in exchange for another glass, the two drunkards did as she told them. Half-stupid as they already were, neither of them suspected a thing when she smoothed her skirts down and tucked her fichu back in. At the last moment, she had an idea-

And reached for the keys in the pocket of her apron- she locked John in the room.

He liked that, being at her mercy after all. Smiling devilishly to herself, she accompanied her would-be alcohol thieves back upstairs and granted them another round, ‘till almost another hour had passed and it was time for everyone to leave.

Once she’d swept them all out onto the streets and locked the front door for the night, she returned to the cellar.

“There you are”, a voice greeted her smugly, “I knew you were only tricking me.”

“I wouldn’t be so sure about that”, Lola replied with a husky darkness in her tone and walked before him, her hips swaying alluringly from left to right.

In the empty tap room, neither of them could hold back any longer and soon, a table became their bed and instead of re-telling each other tales of the old days, they did everything they’d done back then again.

Exhausted, she at last leaned back against John’s broad chest, who continued to fondle her, one hand between her legs, thrusting in and out at a leisurely pace while the other fondled her nipples, twisting and pulling deliciously.

“What a night”, she concluded, groaning as John affirmed her statement by driving his fingers deeper and more forcefully against all the good places within her.

“Mhm”, he then affirmed verbally, “what a surprise”, and stroked her into another pinnacle of pleasure, which she tried to repay applying her own hand to him until his hips bucked and he spilt in the close confines of her fist.

Without saying another word, Lola undid her apron and wiped first her hands, than him with it, cleaning them both off.

They were tired, and for her part, Lola could have fallen asleep then and there in John’s arms, but that wasn’t how this would play out, how life worked.

Silently, their desire saturated, they dressed and Lola retrieved their glasses and the carafe, still not empty, putting them on the table they had just had each other on.

One glass couldn’t hurt, a toast to the past, to what had been, and to this night.

“How did you come here, Lola?”, John suddenly asked and Lola began to recount.

 

For a while, she had continued doing business as usual, trying to forget the almost certainly dead Lord Simcoe and trying to work away the fear and uncertainty.

When she’d heard of ships sailing for Nova Scotia carrying black people to Canada, she had been wary instantly and fear had grown in her heart. They wanted to round them up, something wasn’t right about what was going on there.

They, those fathers of “all men are created equal” America, had done what she’d foreseen and Lola wept at the thought of what would now happen to so many men, women and children who had been given the hope of freedom in Canada but were now in chains, their hopes crushed.

And then, fear had set in and taken hold of her. She was so afraid she rose feeling sick every morning- she had no deed of manumission to prove she was free should she be stopped and asked for it, how could she because technically, she was still a slave, she’d just been a little more efficient when she’d chosen to escape her fate by ship.

A ship would, given the recent events, not save her this time and so, she had, with a heavy heart, decided to leave on foot.

For a small sum, she had sold her tent to another girl and packed a few belongings, only so much as she could carry wrapped up in a big sheet. She didn’t own much anyway and what she owned had been almost worthless, but this had been her home, so of course leaving had hurt.

With a heavy heart, she had made her way for the city gates.

It was risky, but it had worked. The sentinel, personally uninterested in politics, had been easily persuaded by her charms and that'd been the last time she’d ever done such things for money or favours.

In exchange for a quick spell behind the sentry box, she was let through and disappeared into the darkness.

She’d had no idea where she was going, only knew she had to aim for a north-western direction if she wanted to cross into British-controlled territory.

Throughout this ordeal, she continued to be sick and for a week or so, even walked all by herself through fields and woods, following larger and smaller paths; it was a wonder she hadn’t been robbed- or worse.

But God had sheltered her from peril and on her eighth or ninth day, a family with horses and three carts filled to the brim with household effects and followed by three domestics had passed her by.

They had been wary of her at first, but when she had given her reason for leaving, they had seen in her a likeminded person and offered her sit on the last cart with the children, it was only an act of Christian charity to help another loyalist.

That family had fled their home for being known loyalists whi had to expect acts of retaliation and had like her, decided to try their luck up north instead of staying in the States.

When after two weeks, they crossed through woodlands into Canada in a place where there were no sentinels, they all cried out in joy. The first settlement they stumbled upon was Newark and they saw the British flag fly above the town, then even smaller and made of huts.

For a while, she had stayed with the family and minded their children in exchange for a place to sleep and some food until circumstances forced her to take to bed for two months with heavy fevers before she recovered.

It was then she had taken up helping Mrs Colton to oversee the small tavern they had in the meantime procured with the generous credit of a wealthy relation in England and it had become apparent that she was better-suited to the task of running the business than her employer.

To the Coltons, she had never dared to breathe a word about her past profession for fear they, god-fearing and a little prudish (from what she’d heard, or rather not heard, through the thin walls, she could have given both husband and wife some advice on how to do it), would send her away.

By then, her circumstances did not allow being alone in a draughty tent anymore and besides, she was growing attached to the idea of the life she was leading. While Mr Colton was busy building up the respectable, perhaps even a little more lavish than usual life the family had had in what was now the United States, Mrs Colton was supposed to manage the tavern, which the latter would pass on to her. Mrs Colton was very kind and seeing as she kept the place tidy and orderly and had on occasion even broken up fights between drunk patrons when necessary, she had earned herself the esteem and trust of her employer, who did not like the idea of such work herself at all.

She had a bed, a job that wasn’t unenjoyable and she made regular, good money- and then there was also Jane, who was her everything.

 

“She is your daughter, isn’t she?”, John concluded when her name cropped up in passing during her narrative.

“She is. And she is everything to me.”

At that, John’s tongue loosened and he told her of his daughters, five of them in total, and one son, of England and the big house he had there and how terrible it was that four of his children still were there and couldn’t accompany them to Canada, him and his wife, the lovely Elizabeth, who loved him and who was gone from him now and whom he also loved terribly.

It sounded like a good life, one many would aspire to. A life in another world, one that wasn’t hers and would always remain a little surreal, however hard she would try imagining it.

They were the products of very different worlds, and yet, they’d come to meet a few times, had collided in a bed somewhere in York City and on a table in Newark, Canada. And it had always been wonderful, but there couldn’t be more than that and it appeared they’d said everything left to say already.

John finished his tale and pulled her close into his arm. Over the course of the evening, the blasted powder had worn off somewhat, showing he was still as rudely ginger as she remembered him- but maybe government officials weren’t supposed to have flames for hair.

He looked younger, happier.

“Thank you, Lola”, he whispered into her ear. “For everything.”

“No, I thank you, John”, she said and meant that, even though it seemed John didn’t understand. And he didn’t need to.

“We must part, mustn’t we?”, he asked, suddenly sounding like a child fearful of saying goodbye to a loved one.

“We must. It’s good to know you’re well. It’s good we had this night.”

John nodded silently and tightened his arm around her shoulder, unwilling to part, but he knew as well as her this was goodbye.

“I will never forget you”, he said at last, standing at the door, ready to disappear into the darkness.

“I hope you won’t when the legal assembly meets again”, she responded before she added a less political and equally true “and I’ll never forget you, either.”

“What are we to part as?”

“Friends”, Lola answered decidedly, “companions on the long way to Canada.”

John nodded.

“Now my friend, you go back to your life, your wife, your children. _She_ sounds nice, actually.”

“I find no words of advice for you, Lola. I am glad you travelled safe and I wish only the best for you and Jane. Give her my regards.”

With one last glance at each other, they said adieu.

“Lord Simcoe”, she lowly whispered to the dark figure in the street and thought she’d heard him reply “Lady Lola”.

 

Smiling to herself and still feeling the afterglow of the wine and above all, pleasure, she quietly slipped into the upstairs room she shared with Jane.

“You’re late”, a sleepy little voice announced in a complaining tone she knew only too well and that always reminded her of someone.

“Come to bed post haste, mama, that means immediately.”

Chuckling lowly at the uncanny resemblance, Lola rid herself of her day wear and slipped next to Jane under the covers.

The reason John hadn’t understood why she had thanked him earlier snuggled close to her while simultaneously taking up to thirds of the bed.

Tomorrow, John would return to his duties behind the governor’s desk, and she to hers behind the bar, both of them in their respective way working towards a brighter future for their daughter.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ok, so I have to admit I took a few liberties with history here. Lola of course is an entirely fictional character TURN came up with and so, the plot (if there is any besides the central action in each chapter) is, too, though while not based on historical events, at least inspired by them:
> 
> Elizabeth and John Graves Simcoe did live seperately for a few months from early autumn 1794 to early 1795, but the reasons were different ones than given here. Elizabeth wanted to visit some friends at Quebec and as rumours of a military invasion threatened Upper Canada, she was uneasy remaining there, especially since her husband was leaving on a mission to Detroit and with two small children. To understand the full scope of her fears, Elizabeth even recorded several instances of dreams in which she was running through a wood, accompanied by her husband and Talbot while being shot at by an invisible enemy.
> 
> Only a few days into the voyage, Elizabeth wrote an extensive account of her journey (which you can find in Ross Robertson's 1911 edition of her diary) so far which she sent to John, closing like this:
> 
> "I should not have sent you this rough (a book containing the letter and some sketches, to whom "rough" is referring) one, but that I know you will be glad in any way to know myself and the children are well, and as comfortable as is possible to be anywhere in your absence.  
> (...) The Long Sault Rapid was less alarming than I expected, but very grand and fine, and nothing but reason would keep one from being afraid. Your sight must be terrified, tho' knowledge makes you rest satisfied.  
> Ever most attachedly yours,  
> E. Simcoe.
> 
> The going down the river is so fine a thing altogether I wish for you every moment. I should be in ecstasies if you were here to partake of them."
> 
> Clearly, she missed him, especially given the possibility that if the US would invade and it would come to battle, she might lose her husband and never see him again alive. 
> 
> However, their marriage wasn't always happy and instances of disagreements were recorded. 
> 
> John didn't like his wife's choices of entertainment and Elizabeth was fed up with trying to figure out if his latest ailment was real or imaginary:  
> "(...) He had a gouty pain in his hand before, and it is supposed the shock of the cannon firing so immediately above him fixed the disorder in his head. He is now recovered, and has a pain in his foot, which perhaps would more effectually relieve his head if it were more violent."
> 
> Other people in Upper Canada at the time noted that Simcoe was ill all the time (the whites of one's eyes turning yellow is seldom a sign of good health) and in a perpetually foul mood. 
> 
> Thomas Talbot was real and it is fair to say she loved to write about him in her diary. While her husband was incapacitated or away attending to his duties, the two would spend a lot of time together. If they had an affair, as Simcoe suspects his wife of having in the story we don't know, at least there is no real evidence they ever did. 
> 
> Newark still exists, it's called Niagara-on-the-Lake these days and was only named Newark by Governor Simcoe in 1792.
> 
> The song is called "The Gentleman Soldier".
> 
> “I hope you won’t when the legal assembly meets again”: Lola refers to Simcoe's efforts to abolish slavery in Upper Canada, which he didn't manage to (as TURN falsely claimed) as at least a third of his Legislative Assembly were slave owners themselves and voted against such a move. Instead, a compromise was found which would gradually abolish slavery over the course of time. Simcoe, who was an abolitionist, felt compelled to impose a law when in 1793, a young woman called Chloe Cooley was sold across the border to the US against her will. When Simcoe heard of the horrific circumstances (Cooley was bound and physically mistreated as she was forced into the boat taking her across the Niagara River), he reacted with outrage and made it his goal to abolish slavery in his province. Although he was unsuccessful and many of those enslaved at the time did not profit from his law, it was the first of its kind in the British Empire and according to some sources ended slavery in Upper Canada years before the act outlawing slavery in most parts of the Empire was passed some fourty years later.  
> As an escaped slave herself, Lola of course supports abolitionism and hopes unconditional abolition of slavery might still happen in Upper Canada in her lifetime.
> 
> Wow, so this is it. Thank you so much for your interest in this little story everyone, it means a lot to me! Thanks for supporting this story.


End file.
